Pubdate: Fri, 18 Mar 1999
Source: Wall Street Journal (NY)
Copyright: 1999 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.wsj.com/
Author: REDFORD GIVENS

No one was robbing, whoring and murdering over drugs when addicts could buy
all of the heroin, cocaine, morphine, opium and any other drug cheaply and
legally at the comer drug store. When addicts had access to pure
pharmaceutical drugs, overdoses were virtually unheard of. In short, our
so-called "drug problems" are almost entirely generated by irresponsible
drug prohibition laws.

We can extricate ourselves from the monstrous disaster drug prohibitionists
have led us into by repealing drug prohibition and installing a regulated
market for adult drug use that can handle the real problems caused by drugs
which are insignificant compared to the costs of drug prohibition.

REDFORD GIVENS San Francisco

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