LEGALIZE MARIJUANA? NOT SO FAST

Cannabis is not alcohol and the current confusion about marijuana
does not constitute a situation anything like Prohibition.

There's a sense among a lot of Californians that legalizing marijuana
and then taxing it is some sort of panacea that would solve many law
enforcement problems, make it safer to smoke pot and also produce a
tax bonanza of $1 billion or more per year.

Voters will see just such a proposal in November.

Much of the pro-legalization thinking is based on analogies to the
alcohol experience, which sees various forms of booze putting about
$3 billion into the coffers of state and local governments each year
and providing more than 300,000 jobs around the state.

But cannabis is not alcohol and the current confusion about marijuana
does not constitute a situation anything like Prohibition.

For one thing, major distilling companies had produced whiskey, beer
and other alcoholic beverages legally for many decades before
Prohibition. By contrast, not a single significant taxpaying company
has produced so much as an ounce of pot in this state or nation in
the last century, if ever.

Yes, criminal elements did control much of the booze trade during
Prohibition and they did foment gang warfare during the 1920s and
early '30s. But backyard breweries and distilleries were far more
rare than pot gardens are today. And when it came to larger-scale
production, foreigners were rarely involved. So it was far easier to
bring alcohol into the realm of legitimate business than is likely
with legalized pot.

Then there's the matter of federal law. When Prohibition ended, so
did most federal alcohol raids. But Californians have their heads in
the sand if they believe a state vote to legalize pot will end all
federal raids on growers and gardens.

Yes, President Obama indicated while campaigning in 2008 that he most
likely would not hassle mom and pop medical marijuana operations,
from growers to dispensaries. And raids have eased off considerably
since his election, even if they have not completely stopped. Obama
and his attorney general, Eric Holder, reserve the option to raid
under the constitutional provision giving federal law precedence over
state laws.

Obama never said a positive word about recreational marijuana, not
covered by the 1996 Proposition 215, which made medpot legal in this
state but authorized no other sort of use. Sure, plenty of pot users
pay $40 or $50 to shady doctors who hand out the "recommendations"
needed to get marijuana at dispensaries that have proliferated in
some counties. That's a subterfuge and an end-run around the law, but
falls far short of open defiance of federal law, which full
legalization would amount to.

Many precedents suggest such defiance would cause the federal Drug
Enforcement Administration to restart serious anti-pot enforcement
efforts again if recreational use is "legalized."

Then there are the matters of price and taxation. The sales and
excise levies that would produce the largest share of taxes
anticipated by backers of legalization depend directly both on price
and the openness of sales.

How likely are pot prices to remain at their present level of $10 per
ounce or more? Not very, if every pot user can suddenly grow his or
her own in a backyard or a window box. Which means estimates of the
tax take from legalization are probably far higher than it would
really be - especially if most pot became home grown and not subject
to any taxation at all other than what new growers might pay head
shops for seeds or small plants.

And how likely are the big commercial pot growers - those who
maintain heavily armed cadres of illegal immigrants around their
often-boobytrapped gardens in national forests and other woodlands -
to allow themselves to be taxed?

With legalization already likely to bring the street price of pot
down, the drug cartels behind many of today's illicit operations
won't want to give a nickel to the tax man.

They may, in fact, engage in some kind of warfare against growers who
do pay taxes and let themselves be regulated. They won't take kindly
to competition or to having their street dealers made irrelevant.

Which means legalization could bring to California the kind of drug
wars that now plague countries like Mexico and Colombia, where gangs
and cartels openly defy police. It's a Third World horror scene
California need not inflict on itself.

None of that even mentions the moral and medical questions often
raised both by doctors and police: What is the social benefit of
legalizing a mind-altering substance that produces passivity and
lethargy? And what about addiction, anxiety and psychosis, three
conditions the Harvard Mental Health Letter says (in its April issue)
may be associated with regular pot use.

All of which means that life will surely not become simpler if pot
were legalized, nor would the benefits be as clear-cut as proponents suggest.