Pubdate: Sat, 17 Nov 2012
Source: Daily Freeman (Kingston, NY)
Copyright: 2012 Daily Freeman
Contact:  http://www.dailyfreeman.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3269

LEGALIZING MARIJUANA

In a watershed moment, voters in two states -- Colorado and 
Washington -- have voted to legalize marijuana.

Note that those votes were not to legalize the medicinal use of 
marijuana, which prohibitionists and the federal government continue 
to resist against all logic and humanity. The ballot questions were 
to legalize the private use of weed for no more exalted purpose than 
just getting high.

On one level, the votes represent a rejection of the federal 
government's more-or-less uncompromising, four-decades-long "War on Drugs."

More broadly, the "War on Drugs" is the kissing cousin to 
Prohibition, by which the nation, in a fit of puritanical insanity, 
in 1920 prohibited the sale, manufacture and distribution of 
alcoholic beverages.

Not coincidentally, the federal government had entered the drug 
prohibition business only six years earlier, pre-empting what had 
been an area of state jurisdiction over health.

The attempt to eliminate the consumption of alcohol -- a boon to 
organized crime and a law enforcement disaster -- lasted only 13 
years, but the federal prohibition of non-medicinal drug use has lived on.

The road to this month's vote was a long time coming.

The Gallup poll first started asking Americans about legalizing 
marijuana in 1969, when a scant 12 percent of respondents favored and 
84 percent opposed.

A year ago, the issue reached a crossover point, with 50 percent of 
Americans supporting legalization and opposition declining to 46 percent.

It remains to be seen how state legalization will play out, as state 
law cannot pre-empt federal jurisdiction as long as Congress 
continues to insist. As Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado put it 
after the vote, "Don't break out the Cheetos or Goldfish too quickly."

But the demographic breakdown suggests the die has been cast for 
permanent cultural change that eventually will get the attention of 
federal lawmakers.

Legalization is most popular among younger Americans and is soundly 
opposed only by persons 65 years and older, with only 31 percent supporting it.

Over time, ever-increasing portions of the electorate will likely 
support legalization.

On practical grounds, we favor the legalization of marijuana because 
its prohibition has been a failure as high rates of use and 
acceptance indicate. Further, continued enforcement unnecessarily 
occupies police, prosecutors and courts and creates
criminal records for millions of dealers and users.

On philosophical grounds we support legalization not because we think 
marijuana (or alcohol) invariably is harmless, but because its use in 
a society that values individual freedom properly should be seen as a 
matter of individual choice and, if it becomes necessary, of medical 
redress, not prosecution and incarceration.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom