Source: Creative Loafing
Contact:  404-420-1402
Website:  http://www.creativeloafing.com
Pubdate:  Saturday, 3 Jan 1998
Newshawk (and author) writes:  Creative Loafing is a free weekly paper for
the Atlanta area. Readership is 180,000, and it therefore claims to be the
largest "alternative" city weekly in America. My op-ed appeared in their
"Think Tank" editorial section.

LEGALIZE POT

The only thing Ralph David Abernathy III might be guilty of is hypocrisy

I am no fan of state Senator Ralph David Abernathy III. But the
holier-than-thou war being mounted against him for attempting to smuggle a
tiny amount of marijuana through the Atlanta airport is making me sick.

Gov. Miller has denounced Abernathy's act as "outrageous." Lt. Governor
Pierre Howard is working with other oh-so-shocked legislators to craft new
laws to punish lawmakers who commit similar sins.

What's the big deal? Abernathy is an adult. What he chooses to put into his
own body should be his own business.

Some argue that Abernathy should be punished simply because he broke the
law. But bad laws deserve neither our respect nor our obedience. The laws
prohibiting the use, possession and sale of marijuana are similarly idiotic
and despotic.

Indeed, marijuana is far safer than the most popular legal recreational
drugs in America, alcohol and tobacco. Alcohol and tobacco kill hundreds of
thousands of Americans each year.

Those who today enjoy beer or wine, yet condemn Abernathy for possessing
marijuana, should pause and reflect that, a mere few decades ago, booze --
not marijuana -- was illegal. Alcohol was outlawed between 1920 and 1933.
Eventually the country came to its senses, and booze was re-legalized.

Marijuana was perfectly legal in America well into this century. The
federal government didn't outlaw pot until 1937, and then only after
Congress was bamboozled by a sordid propaganda campaign of outright lies.

Just as our grandparents rebelled against alcohol Prohibition, today
millions of Americans are rebelling against pot prohibition. According to
the federal Department of Health and Human Services, 10 million Americans
smoke marijuana monthly, and about 20 million use it yearly. And many more
Americans like me, who have never touched the stuff, view the war against
it as a terrible injustice.

Rather than attacking Abernathy, we should be aiming our deepest contempt
at politicians like President Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, and House
Speaker Newt Gingrich -- all of whom smoked pot in college, suffered no ill
effects whatsoever from it, and yet today wage a savage (and
politically-motivated) war against others who merely choose, as they
themselves once did, to smoke the same substance.

Which brings me to the one good reason there might be for attacking
Abernathy. Does he favor keeping marijuana illegal? If so, then he should
indeed be booted out of office. Not for smuggling dope, but for outrageous
and disgusting hypocrisy -- a hypocrisy unfortunately shared by many other
politicians.

James Harris
freelance writer; editor, The Liberator and The Liberator Online (both
published by the Advocates for Self-Government)