Editorial

TO DECRIMINALIZE THE USE OF DRUGS, PART 1 OF A SERIES

Drive slowly along Vancouver's East Hastings Street or any other
drug-soaked neighbourhood, and the misery visible on every corner offers a
reminder of why we have drug laws. At the same time, the smorgasbord of
heroin, cocaine, pills and marijuana being sold on those mean corners, for
a fraction of what they cost 20 years ago, underlines the inescapable fact
that those laws have never worked, and probably never will. A different
law, supply and demand, has proved too strong.

Yet still the drug laws are enforced, albeit unevenly. Even as Canada's
overall crime rate fell again last year (the ninth consecutive such
decline), the number of drug charges jumped by 9 per cent to record levels.
Coast to coast, police laid almost 88,000 charges, just over half involving
simple cannabis possession. Among those charged with possessing drugs of
all types, an estimated 13 per cent each year are jailed.

Why so many arrests? It is not because police are all in hot pursuit of
casual, small-scale drug users, who in most communities have long ceased to
be of much interest to the local drug squad. Rather, the numbers reflect
the fact that drugs in general, and cannabis in particular, are more
readily available than ever before and have an assured market.

Do the current criminal sanctions hold out any solution? The battle lines
in this decades-old debate have lately been redrawn. On the one hand remain
the shrinking number of drug warriors (led, as always, by the United
States) who perceive drug-taking as destructive and morally wrong, an
insidious enemy to be resisted at almost any cost. On the other are an
ever-growing number of critics, most recently Britain's influential
magazine The Economist, who maintain that since the war against drugs was
lost many years ago, its huge fiscal and social price tag outweighs all
possible benefit.

Scrap this futile campaign, The Economist and others say. Disregard the
moral issue, and legalize drugs within a regulatory framework that would
not only make drug-taking safer but save countless billions in
law-enforcement costs, while depriving organized crime of its most
lucrative source of profit. Drug sales, moreover, could be taxed. With 1.5
million marijuana users in Canada (by Canadian Medical Association
estimate), think of the revenues.

Both schools of thought, we will argue over the next few days, are deeply
flawed. But perhaps between them they hold an answer and perhaps it is
this: Decriminalize all -- yes, all -- personal drug use, henceforth to be
regarded primarily as a health issue rather than as a crime, while
simultaneously stepping up pressure on the importers, manufacturers and
large-scale dealers.

The resulting difficulties would be considerable, the chief one being the
troublesome question of causality. If it were no longer a criminal offence
to consume or buy drugs, but rather a simple misdemeanour, would that not
encourage wider abuse? It might, at least in the short term. But the net
gain would be greater.

Outright legalization would be better still, its proponents contend, but
they are mistaken. Their core argument rests with the 19th-century thinker
John Stuart Mill, who in his famous essay On Liberty asserted that the
state should take no role in regulating citizens' behaviour unless it harms
others. "Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is
sovereign," Mill wrote. In other words, a person should be free to smoke
pot, inject heroin, jump off buildings or indulge in any other risky
behaviour, provided no larger damage occurs.

Fine. But what of, say, the dealer who supplies cocaine -- legally or
otherwise -- to a customer whose life is subsequently wrecked? By what
stretch can it be argued that no harm is being inflicted?

Second, legalizing drugs would send the message that they are somehow
risk-free. For some recreational aficionados who lead productive lives,
perhaps those risks are indeed small. But what of the unskilled, poorly
educated teenage dropout who stares into the future and sees nothing? If
drugs were to be legalized and sold from licensed outlets, the quality
would improve and the price would plummet. All the more reason to
experiment. All the more likelihood of coming to grief.

Third, state-sanctioned drugs would open the door to the use of all drugs,
including new ones not yet brought to market, whose impact can only be
guessed at.

Above all, the legalize-drugs argument fails because it is wildly
unrealistic. More than 30 years have passed since Canada's LeDain
commission concluded that marijuana should be decriminalized, yet tens of
thousands of pot-smokers are still arrested each year. Legalization would
be more contentious still. Not only is Canada a signatory to several United
Nations conventions specifically barring the legalization of drugs, but if
this country did take such a step, the howl of rage from the United States
would generate lasting cross-border difficulties.

Decriminalizing all personal drug use -- formally exempting users from
prosecution through amendments to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act
while continuing to outlaw sales -- would also would stir serious U.S.
concern. But the anger would be far more muted. And if the benefits of
decriminalization were to become clearer, which down the road they might,
the concern might steadily fade into quiet envy.

Tomorrow: drugs and the police.