HARDER TO ABUSE WHEN POT LEGAL

Dear editor:

Re: Don't make it legal: Herder (Sept. 11, Chatham This Week)

Chief Herder expresses concerns about kids being able to easily get pot if
it's legalized. If he'd read the most basic research on the subject, he'd
know that, historically speaking, the biggest single cause of drug
epidemics among children is anti-drug campaigns. The first and best example
was alcohol prohibition in the US.

Alcohol was outlawed with a campaign of "Save the Children from Alcohol".
But within five years, the US was in the middle of the biggest teen
drinking epidemic it had ever seen.

Some of Prohibition's early supporters turned against it because they said
their kids found it easier than ever to get alcohol -- and some of the kids
even became involved in the bootlegging trade.

If Chief Herder had read the US government's own studies on the marijuana
subject, he would know that US kids currently report it's easier to get
illegal drugs than the legal ones -- for the same reasons kids found it
easier to get alcohol during alcohol prohibition.

If he's really interested in solutions to this problem, he ought to start
by reading the major research on the subject. He can find the full text of
the Senate Commission report on the Canadian Senate Web site.

Clifford Schaffer

Agua Dulce, California