Massachusetts has voter initiative for a reason: It gives citizens the power to directly decide laws. When voters decide an issue at the ballot box, their say should be final unless it's formally repealed.

A 2008 ballot question's approval by 65 percent of Massachusetts voters made possession of one ounce or less of marijuana a noncriminal offense, punishable by a $100 fine. In Fall River, the question passed with about 60 percent of the vote - 16,620 in favor to 12,077 against. A clear majority of Bay State voters said that they wanted to put an end to marijuana prosecutions involving small possession.

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I am writing about the legalization of marijuana. I think marijuana should be legalized because even though it's illegal, people are still going to buy and use it anyway. I have never heard of someone dying due to the use of smoking marijuana.

More people have died using other drugs like crack, cocaine and alcohol. Alcohol causes more than 25,000 deaths a year in either traffic accidents or from other related causes.

Marijuana might cause other problems but nothing compared to any other type of drug. There are more than 29,000 recorded deaths related to drugs like meth, crack, cocaine, ecstasy and alcohol.

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Last Tuesday, Somerville's Office of Prevention held a forum which addressed the risks of marijuana use, particularly in response to recent studies suggesting that youths in Massachusetts see pot as a safer alternative to alcohol and hard drugs.

Held in the third floor library of the Arthur D. Healey Middle School on Meacham St. by Cory Mashburn, head of the Office of Prevention in Somerville, and workers from Somerville Cares About Prevention (SCAP), a division of the Office of Prevention, the forum featured a presentation about the risks of marijuana use and some common misunderstandings about the drug, as well as a presentation on the legality of pot in Massachusetts. People of all ages were encouraged to attend, the purpose to ultimately address the fact that there has been a 30% increase in high school and middle school marijuana use since its decriminalization in 2008.

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Bad Calls on Youth Sports Spending

District Attorney Joseph D. Early Jr. is stretching the rules in his handling of funds forfeited from drug dealers. However well-meaning his motives, he is out of bounds here.

Under the banner of "law enforcement," Mr. Early has been lavishing the forfeited funds on youth sports, last year spending more than $123,000 on field improvements, equipment, uniforms and the like.

Further, almost all of his largesse has landed within a single municipality: his home city of Worcester. Sometimes, money goes to programs that could probably readily pay their own way on the upgrades; and there have been cases of contractors who are also campaign contributors of Mr. Early's being hired for work such as tennis-court repaving.

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Westborough school officials are escalating their war on drugs with a new policy that is adversarial, intrusive and unnecessary.

Under a policy recently approved by the School Committee, school officials are authorized to take saliva samples from any student suspected of being under the influence of drugs. A school nurse is to examine the student first, and the student can refuse the test, but will face immediate suspension if he refuses, or if the test returns a positive result, with a report added to his permanent conduct record.

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Voters in the Nov. 6 election face an unusually broad swath of political contests and ballot questions.

After reviewing the three statewide ballot questions - questions 1, 2 and 3 - we support passage of all three. Our philosophy on ballot questions is that adults should be allowed to make reasonable decisions that affect their health and life.

We feel that all three questions tackle difficult and timely issues that society has grappled with, and that lawmakers have generally seen fit to steer clear of.

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To the editor:

Regarding John Burciaga's thoughtful April 18 op-ed, the drug war is largely a war on marijuana smokers. In 2010, there were 853,839 marijuana arrests in the United States, almost 90 percent for simple possession. At a time when state and local governments are laying off police, firefighters and teachers, this country continues to spend enormous public resources criminalizing Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis. The end result of this ongoing culture war is not necessarily lower rates of use.

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Local school officials invaded our children's privacy using police powers in their zeal to address use of marijuana like local vigilantes.

And what did they find? Zip, zilch, zero, nada. The joke is on them and on their silly Keystone Kops operation. As for the rest of us citizens, are we all dead from the neck up? Where is the outrage? This terrible precedent will come back to haunt us all.

Some young people want what our grandparents fought and broke the law for almost a century ago: the right to their own drug of choice, and for which we now have a liquor store on every corner.

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George Will correctly points out how our drug laws create opportunities for gangs and cartels to make billions of dollars tax-free by filling the seemingly insatiable demand ("Drug policy calls for further review," April 12).

But Will is wrong to assume that legalization would cause a sharp rise in drug problems. As a former undercover detective who sent more people to jail for drugs than I'd like to admit, I've seen that criminalization is not an effective deterrent.

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Whether under the guise of needed taxation or failed prohibition let us be clear: alcohol and tobacco are both proven to be damaging substances and adding another one, medical marijuana, especially when scientific facts prove marijuana's harms, is a slippery slope with far-reaching implications.

I oppose the legalization of medical marijuana in our commonwealth for several important and substantive reasons and will testify against House Bill No. 3885, "An act for the humanitarian medical use of marijuana." Permit me to explain.

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BOSTON - As state legislators Tuesday weighed arguments for and against a ballot petition that would legalize the medical use of marijuana, state Sen. Stanley Rosenberg - who was treated for cancer during the past year - made a pitch for his own bill that would require tighter controls on the drug's use.

"In the petition, any physician can say they believe medical marijuana will help this patient whether or not their condition or disease was listed on the legislation," Rosenberg, a Democrat from Amherst, said in an interview after he testified at the Statehouse hearing. "I think that's a huge loophole that creates the opportunity for rogue physicians to go into the marijuana distribution business."

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Rick Doblin, founder of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelics Studies, said the government and the National Institute on Drug Abuse has a "monopoly on marijuana research" at Suffolk University NORML's 2012 Cannabis Curriculum and Hemposium on Tuesday.

"The only place in the country that has NIDA approval to grow marijuana for research is a government-run facility at the University of Mississippi," he said. "We have been in court for six years trying to get clearance."

About 65 students and speakers gathered at Suffolk University for a forum that encouraged students to do research and projects on cannabis and its prohibition, in addition to providing a place for students to showcase their results.

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Back in January, a Wayland Police officer stopped a carful of teenagers for speeding. In the car he found something called "Cheeba Chews;" marijuana-based candies sold in California and Colorado under the guise of medicine. Wrapped in "Tootsie Roll" style wrappers, these powerful chewables consist of the most active ingredient in marijuana - - THC - and their taffystyle packaging is conspicuously attractive to kids. This incident is not unique to Wayland - in the past six months, Cheeba Chews in the possession of teenagers have surfaced in several other Massachusetts communities, often times shipped or transported by students from the Commonwealth attending college in a state where marijuana has been legalized as medicine.

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Uptight Bay Staters need to "get a grip" on their hang-ups about weed, according a doc who is a leading national advocate for the legalization of medical marijuana.

Dr. Donald I. Abrams, chief of hematology/oncology at San Francisco General Hospital and a cancer specialist at the University of California San Francisco's Osher Center for Integrative Medicine, is headed to Boston this week to lecture at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. But he took time out of his schedule yesterday to lecture the commonwealth ahead of time, after learning local law enforcement is balking at a citizen initiative to decriminalize medical pot.

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California voters chose to legalize medical marijuana in 1996 with Proposition 15, but controversy surrounding the medical uses of the drug continues to this day. Although the use and distribution of marijuana for medical purposes is legal in the state with a permit, the federal government often displays its authority over the state by shutting down marijuana dispensaries. On Monday, April 1, federal agents raised the controversy to a new level when they raided Oaksterdam University, the nation's first marijuana trade school, which teaches cultivation, edible production and dispensary business. The institution is owned by one of the most prominent proponents of legalized medical marijuana, activist Richard Lee, whose own home, dispensary and marijuana museum were also raided.

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I have been wondering why marijuana is not legal in the state of Massachusetts. It doesn't make sense to why we make such a big deal about that particular drug. There are worse things to worry about other than marijuana. Our economy would benefit greatly if marijuana was legal.

If it was legal, it could be sold in pharmacies or stores specialized in marijuana. It would be able to be taxed which in turn, helps the government, and it would take crime off the streets. A lot of people start to use marijuana because it is like being rebellious.

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Marblehead - I'm writing about Edward Friedman's not-so-thoughtful letter, "Legalization not needed," (above). No mention was made as to why Friedman wants marijuana to remain completely unregulated, untaxed and controlled by criminal gangs - just like alcohol was when it was illegal.

Just because a product is legal does not mean that there are no regulations as to when and where it can be used. We have lots of restrictions as to when and where alcohol and tobacco products can be used.

Kirk Muse,

Mesa, Ariz.

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Marblehead - Why does Marblehead need legalized marijuana? ("Bill to legalize marijuana gets local boost," Marblehead Reporter, March 15-21)

If the main goal for most users is to get high, why is Marblehead, with all its advantages, its fine homes, high salaries, beautiful scenery, so lacking in fulfillment that a majority of its voting residents and their local rep think we need to be artificially induced to be fleetingly happy in an acrid smoke-filled haze?

And don't forget the "revenue upside." When the state needs money, we get a state-sponsored lottery and, when then that's not enough, state-licensed gambling casinos. We're maxing out the sin taxes on cigarettes and alcohol, so let's legalize grass and tax that, too. Is there anything the least bit cynical in the state making money the more we smoke, drink, gamble and toke?

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To the editor:

I'm sure the DanversCares prevention coalition means well ("DanversCares stands up against marijuana use," March 12, 2012), but similar groups throughout the U.S. are typically misinformed about cannabis and are acting out of fear rather than the actual truth.

Cannabis (marijuana) is never prescribed; it is only recommended by physicians due to the risk of government punishing them and taking away their license. Cannabis isn't a "drug," but rather a relatively safe God-given plant as described on the first page of the Bible. It has been studied throughout the world for more than 5,000 years and has clearly been shown to have medical value.

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NATICK =AD The article =93Parents, experts worry about young brains on pot,=94 March 4, reported, =93locally, the substance abuse coalition Natick Together2 has a five-year, $1.1 million federal grant to target marijuana and alcohol.=94 The Drug Free Communities Grant awarded to Natick is actually for $625.000, $125,000 per year for five years. It is a lot of money and people may wonder what Natick or any community can do to fight underage substance use. Education is a primary goal and currently, our community needs information about the possibility of a ballot question that would legalization medicinal marijuana.

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