Pubdate: Thu, 29 Jan 2015
Source: Boston Globe (MA)
Copyright: 2015 Globe Newspaper Company
Contact: http://services.bostonglobe.com/news/opeds/letter.aspx?id=6340
Website: http://bostonglobe.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/52
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v15/n049/a10.html
Author: Steven S. Epstein

OUR ELECTED LEADERS MAY JUST COME TO SEE THE LIGHT

It is interesting news that the Senate president, not known as a 
friend of the initiative process, created a special Senate committee 
on marijuana, and that Governor Baker, despite saying he is "going to 
always be opposed to legalizing" recreational use, also is curious 
about the experiments with legalization in other parts of the country 
("Baker staunch in opposition to legalizing marijuana," Metro, Jan. 23).

Perhaps this indicates that the Legislature will attempt, before the 
printing of the 2016 ballots, to do what activists will surely 
accomplish with an initiative. For it is long past time to end an 
ineffectual, unreasonable, and unwholesome policy of prohibition and 
replace it with reasonable regulation and low rates of taxation.

Doing so would destroy the black market and, in the process, make 
marijuana harder for underage users to obtain. It would conserve 
scarce law enforcement resources. It would also liberate adults to 
enjoy in tranquility their right to obtain their individual 
happiness, provided they do no harm and do not pose a significant 
risk of harm to others, as they may when it comes to alcohol.

Steven S. Epstein

Georgetown

The writer is an attorney who is a member of Bay State Repeal, a 
ballot question committee organized to support the 2016 initiative.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom