MARIJUANA'S BLACK-MARKET STATUS A DANGER TO TEENS

To the Editor:

Regarding Ralph Damiani's Dec. 2 column in which he criticizes Gov.
Johson's efforts to raise awareness on the drug war's failure:

The author makes the mistake of assuming that current drug policy
actually protects children from drugs. Teen-agers in New Mexico
likely have no trouble purchasing a host of dangerous drugs their
parents have never even heard of. The thriving black market is very
much youth-oriented.

The Monitoring the Future Survey, an ongoing study of the behaviors,
attitudes and values of young Americans, reports that for every year
from 1975 to 1999, at least 82 percent of high school seniors
surveyed find marijuana "fairly easy" or "very easy" to obtain. In
1999, a whopping 89 percent of high school seniors reported that
marijuana was fairly or very easy to obtain. Unlike legitimate
businesses that sell alcohol, illegal drug dealers do not ID for age,
but they do push profitable, addictive drugs like heroin when given
the chance. Sensible regulation is desperately needed to undermine
the black market and restrict access to drugs.

Marijuana is the most popular illicit drug. Compared to toxic alcohol
and addictive tobacco, marijuana is relatively harmless.

Yet marijuana prohibition is deadly. While there is nothing inherent
in marijuana that compels users to try harder drugs, its black market
status puts users in contact with criminals who sell them.

Current drug policy is an effectively gateway policy. As long as
marijuana remains illegal, the established criminal distribution
network will ensure that kids sample every toxic poison concocted by
drug pushers. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, replacing
marijuana prohibition with regulation would do a better job
protecting children from drugs than the failed drug war.

Robert Sharpe, M.P.A., program officer The Lindesmith Center-Drug
Policy Foundation Washington, D.C.