DRUG POLICY OFFICER PUSHES TO LEGALIZE MARIJUANA

The daily herald's thoughtful Aug. 5th editorial on the Emmit Scott
case makes the point that marijuana is relatively harmless compared
to many legal drugs. If health outcomes determined drug laws instead
of cultural norms marijuana would be legal. The first marijuana laws
were a racist reaction to Mexican immigration during the early 1900s,
passed in large part due to newspaper magnate William Randolph
Hearst's sensationalist yellow journalism. White Americans did not
even begin to smoke marijuana until a soon-to-be entrenched
government bureaucracy began funding reefer madness propaganda.

These days marijuana is confused with '60s counterculture. This
intergenerational culture war does far more harm than marijuana. Drug
policies modeled after America's disastrous experiment with alcohol
prohibition effectively subsidize organized crime, while failing
miserably at preventing use. Indeed, the black market's lack of age
controls makes it easier for kids to buy illegal drugs than beer.

In Europe, the Netherlands has successfully reduced overall drug use
by replacing marijuana prohibition with regulation. Dutch rates of
drug use are significantly lower than U.S. rates in every category.
Separating the hard and soft drug markets and establishing age
controls for marijuana has proven more effective than zero tolerance.
As the most popular illicit drug in the U.S., illegal marijuana
provides the black market contacts that introduce users to drugs like
heroin. This "gateway" is the direct result of a fundamentally flawed
policy.

Given that marijuana is arguably safer than legal alcohol - the plant
has never been shown to cause an overdose death - it makes no sense
to waste tax dollars on failed policies that finance organized crime
and facilitate the use of hard drugs. Drug policy reform may send the
wrong message to children, but I like to think the children
themselves are more important than the message. Opportunistic "tough
on drugs" politicians would no doubt disagree.

A dated comparison of Dutch vs. American rates of drug use can be
found at: http://www.netherlands-embassy.org/c_drugstat.html

More recent figures can be found at: http://www.drugwarfacts.org/thenethe.htm

Sincerely, Robert Sharpe, M.P.A. Program Officer The Lindesmith
Center-Drug Policy Foundation Washington, D.C.