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December 13, 2001
Prohibit Prohibition
By Michael Williams
Throughout the 20th century, the United States government has waged a
war against a freedom of choice, disguised as protection of the
collective good. Through this seemingly altruistic goal, the US
government successfully created powers beyond that which the United
States Constitution was originally founded upon. Society is harmed
when a government prohibits a personal choice, as freedom is stripped
away. The "War on Drugs" is centered around the ideology that illicit
drugs present an inherent risk so great to the public, that
prohibition, the banning of all of these plants and chemicals, is the
only valid way to prevent massive negative societal and individual
effects. Unfortunately, this does not protect the public from these
unfavorable results, and in many cases, actually increases the
dangers. Despite the fear that removal of prohibition will result in
an increased danger to the public, foreign programs have shown this
assumption to be false; the only valid solution to the "problem" is
legalization of all drugs.
Prohibition is unconstitutional; alcohol prohibition required a constitutional
amendment to be created, and no such act was written to allow the illegality of drugs.
Instead, a loophole was utilized, and "with passage of
the Marijuana Stamp Act in 1937 marijuana was prohibited." (ACLU). By refusing to
allow anyone to purchase these stamps, the government effectively eliminated the legal
sale and use of marijuana. This program followed the
original Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914, declaring opiates and cocaine illegal (ACLU)
through the same tax laws, and has now evolved and been extended almost as a blanket
rule to any new chemical that is created which al
ters one's perception of self or reality, regardless of safety or medical merit.
According to the constitution, the government does not have the power to regulate
personal choice, but it created this alternative route to
prohibition despite the massive legal hurdles.
Many believe that health issues are the primary reason for drugs being illegal, yet
the general public does not realize that legal drugs are more toxic than those which
are illegal. In the United States, tobacco alone kil
ls over 430,000, alcohol 110,000 (Drug War Facts), and prescription drugs kill
approximately 32,000 people (Corey) yearly, while all illegal drugs combined,
including cocaine, heroin, amphetamines, marijuana, LSD (lysergi
c acid diethylamide), psilocybin "magic" mushrooms, ecstasy, GHB (gamma
hydroxybutyrate), mescaline and PCP (phencyclidine), killed approximately 11,000
people in 1999 (DAWN). Interestingly, of those 11,000 people, only 5
5% can be attributed to accidental overdose, while approximately 16% were intentional
overdoses in order to commit suicide (DAWN). Additionally, there has not been one
reported death due to a marijuana overdose (Facts). N
SAIDS, medicines such as aspirin and Tylenol were linked to 7,600 deaths in 1996
(Facts), making these nearly as lethal as their illegal counterparts, yet nobody
questions their safety, or calls for their prohibition. Com
pared to illegal drugs, there are many more lethal activities, including driving a
car, participated in daily by the general public, yet these activities, unlike illicit
drugs, are considered integral parts of daily life,
and the dangers presented are considered accepted risks.
Beyond the direct health impact, prohibition has not been shown to have a strong
impact on the demand for drugs in general. Some countries, such as the Netherlands,
have legalized "soft drugs" including marijuana and "mag
ic" mushrooms, while others, such as Italy, Portugal, and Spain, have decriminalized
the use of all drugs, including heroin and cocaine. They also have government
subsidized programs to assist those addicted to "hard drug
s," such as heroin, by providing them with doctor supervised locations to ingest their
drugs. The result of these programs has been lower addiction, use, and death rates in
users. According to a study published in the Bri
tish Journal of Psychiatry and reported by the National Organization for the Reform of
Marijuana Laws (NORML), "removal of criminal prohibitions on cannabis possession
(decriminalization) will not increase the prevalence
of marijuana or any other illicit drug . . . a far greater percentage of Americans age
12 and older (33 percent) report having tried marijuana as do their Dutch counterparts
(16 percent), despite the fact that open sale a
nd possession of pot is permitted in the Netherlands." If prohibition is claimed to
lower the use and availability of illicit drugs in the populace, why do facts speak
otherwise?
By preventing valid manufacturers from making these products, prohibition increases
the dangers associated with drug use by preventing regulation, and forcing drug users
to buy products which have no guarantee of purity o
r dosage. Most deaths associated with heroin are not due to the toxicity of the drug,
but are in fact caused by the lack of ability for the user to accurately gauge how
much of the actual drug they are ingesting. Ecstasy,
or MDMA, related deaths have risen due to misinformation and lack of quality control,
not because of the acute toxicity of MDMA itself. "The DanceSafe organization now
cites at least 100 ecstasy-related deaths. The vast
majority of these, however, were not overdoses but the result of becoming overheated
on the dance floor or ingesting pills sold as ecstasy that were actually dangerous
substances like DXM, a cough suppressant that can cau
se overheating if taken in large quantities, and the stimulant PMA." (Salon). Injuries
and deaths associated with this side-effect of prohibition would be eliminated if
drugs were simply made legal, and real education reg
arding the actual dangers made available.
Apart from the increased health risks of drugs, prohibition increases street violence
by forcing the sale of drugs to the black market. This encourages the formation of
organized crime in order to manufacture and distribu
te these substances under the control of a group of individuals. Additionally, the
structure of laws are such that adults are punished more heavily than minors, and due
to this, minors are enlisted by these organized crim
e units, provided with guns or other weapons, and used to transport or sell these
drugs, with the knowledge that if they are caught, they will not be as heavily
punished.
With this increase of violence and the focus on criminalizing drug use,the criminal
justice system is being overloaded. According to the United States Department of
Justice, "In 1999 the Federal Bureau of Investigation's
Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) estimated that there were 1,532,200 State and local
arrests for drug abuse violations in the United States." Prisons are being filled with
non-violent drug offenders, who "make up 58 percent of
the federal prison population." (ACLU). Because this obsession with locking up drug
sellers and users, violent criminals walk free every day for lack of space.
In addition, mandatory minimum sentencing laws are unfairly distributed, jailing some
for life, simply for selling a chemical which the buyer chooses to ingest, making it a
harsher crime to participate in a consensual act
than to murder someone in the second degree. Arrest rates also do not follow the
demographics of the U.S. population, as "According to the 1991 Uniform Crime Reports,
58% of the drug arrests were of whites versus 41% for
blacks . . . This sounds evenly distributed until you consider that, in 1991, blacks
composed only 12% of the U.S. population." (McWilliams). Crack cocaine, the
"freebased" form of cocaine, is simply powdered cocaine com
bined with baking soda to allow the user to smoke it, and carries a significantly
stiffer penalty for sale and possession than does the powdered form. This is unjust as
they are chemically identical, and interact with the
brain identically. Unfortunately, crack users tend to be poor and from the inner
city, while powdered cocaine users are generally more wealthy, due to the incredible
difference in cost between the two forms. This causes
a severe racial disparity in the execution of drug laws, and subsequently a large
minority population in prisons.
By increasing the rate of consumption, increasing the inherent dangers present with
drug use, and filling our jails, the "War on Drugs" presents an immense monetary drain
on the United States Economy. "In 2000 the Clinton
administration spent more than $17.9 billion." (Facts) on the drug war. For
comparison, "The President is requesting $44.5 billion in discretionary appropriations
for the Department of Education in fiscal year 2002." (De
pt. of Ed.) That means that the US is spending 40% as much on fighting the drug war as
it is on educating the next generation. Imagine the benefits to society if that
eighteen billion dollars was instead spent on educatio
n; the impact of a 40% budget increase would be enormous. Is the threat of illegal
drugs so great, that fighting the personal choice to ingest a substance which alters
one's consciousness is more important than fully educ
ating the next generation of adults?
Additionally, by prohibiting the legal sale of drugs, the government misses an
opportunity to raise an incredible amount of tax revenue. "The international illicit
drug business generates as much as $400 billion in trade
annually according to the United Nations International Drug Control Program. That
amounts to 8% of all international trade and is comparable to the annual turnover in
textiles, according to the study." (UN). By taxing thi
s immense industry, this money could then be used to pay for schools, drug treatment
programs, and health care. Legalization would not only eliminate the $18 billion per
year spent to fight the drug war, but it would in t
urn raise at least $40 billion per year in tax revenue, if one
assumes a mild 10% tax on the drug trade, a number nearly equivalent
to the entire US education budget.
Despite what is officially claimed, the "War on Drugs" is not being
won, is not protecting the children, and is increasing the
destructive characteristics of the drugs themselves. It is imperative
for this country, not only to improve health, education, and fiscal
well being, but also to restore the vital freedom of choice over
one's consciousness, that these chemicals and plants be legalized.
Regulating drugs is regulating thought; it is regulating the freedom
to do what we wish with our own bodies; and it is regulating the
freedom of choice. It is illegal, immoral, and unforgivable. As
Abraham Lincoln said, "A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very
principles upon which our government was founded."
End<{{{
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