REEFER MADNESS STARTED BY A CANADIAN

Editor, The News:

Re: Split-level pot (News Views, March 12). Lost in the debate over
marijuana is the ugly truth behind marijuana prohibition. The first
marijuana laws were enacted in response to Mexican migration during the
early 1900s.

An Edmonton woman writing under the pen name Janey Canuck first warned
Canadians about the dread reefer and its association with non-white
immigrants. The sensationalist yellow journalism of William Randolph Hearst
led to its criminalization in the United States. Whites did not even begin
to smoke marijuana until a soon-to-be entrenched government bureaucracy
began funding reefer madness propaganda.

When threatened, the drug war gravy train predictably decries the "message"
that drug policy reform sends to children. There is a big difference
between condoning marijuana use and protecting children from drugs.

Decriminalization acknowledges the social reality of marijuana and frees
users from the stigma of criminal records. What's really needed is a
regulated market with age controls. Separating the hard and soft drug
markets is critical.

As long as marijuana distribution remains in the hands of organized crime,
consumers will continue to come into contact with addictive drugs like
cocaine. 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 resources on failed policies that finance organized crime and
facilitate hard drug use. Drug policy reform may send the wrong message to
children, but I like to think the children are more important than the message.

A Canadian Senate overview of historical background can be found at:
www.parl.gc.ca/37/1/parlbus/com bus/senate/com-e/ille-e/rep-e/repfi
nalvol2-e.htm

Robert Sharpe Drug Policy Alliance Washington, DC www.drugpolicy.org