Legalization of the oft-stigmatized drug is the only option.
I was eating an absolutely delectable meal at the dining hall several nights ago, minding my own business, and savoring the taste of each bite of my popcorn shrimp, when a random outburst from down the table awoke me from my food-induced reverie. “You know, I used to look down on people who smoke weed, but after trying it, I have to say I don’t see what the fuss is all about. Why the stigma?”
This question has baffled Americans for decades, and has become particularly important in the past several years, with more organized pro-marijuana groups coming to the fore to challenge the heavy hand of government in our social and economic lives. As Ethan Nadelmann ’84, founder of the Drug Policy Alliance, noted in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, “alcohol is the devil we know, while these others [marijuana and similarly illicit drugs] are the devils we don’t.”
Ignorance and xenophobia underpin Americans’ tacit acceptance of this cockamamie drug war, and its roots lay in the events leading up to the hearings conducted for the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937. Marijuana garnered national attention based on racist conjecture that would send shivers down the spines of Americans today; legislators in the Southwest, appalled by Mexican migration to the region in the aftermath of the Mexican Revolution in 1910, observed their occasional use of the drug and posited that it made them so different and vexing (to capture a more refined sentiment of the time).
A slew of states moved to ban the drug, especially as the Depression heightened the competition for jobs, and some outrageous comments were made in support of criminalization. One Montana legislator was quoted for the local newspaper in 1927 as stating, “When some beet field peon takes a few traces of this stuff… he thinks he has just been elected president of Mexico, so he starts out to execute all his political enemies.”
Though the Northeast had no standout Mexican population, in 1919 the New York Times urged that marijuana be prohibited before its use spread, hypothesizing that hard narcotics and alcohol users, cut off by the Harrison Act and the Eighteenth Amendment, respectively, would turn to marijuana as an alternative. This logical fallacy of assuming that all recreational drug users can whimsically turn to another drug to sate a specific high once their drug of choice is no longer an option is emblematic of the time and would lead to similarly shocking arguments at the federal level.
It is difficult to fathom the level of prejudice during this era, but this much is known: the Federal Bureau of Narcotics was created in 1930 under the leadership of Harry Anslinger, a conspicuous racist who made remarks as, “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.” He worked with yellow journalist and newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, a man who despised Mexicans because of Pancho Villa’s usurping of 800,000 acres of his timberland in Mexico and feared marijuana equally for its potential to replace timber as a paper source. In tandem, the duo was relentless and unstoppable. Their efforts culminated in the misguided, ineffective Marijuana Tax Act of 1937. At the hearings, Anslinger stated, “Marijuana is an addictive drug which produces in its users insanity, criminality, and death.”
When Dr. William C. Woodward, General Counsel of the American Medical Association gave testimony claiming that the AMA had no knowledge of marijuana being dangerous, the anti-marijuana crusade carried forward. The conviction of lawmakers was so resolute, that one legislator said, “Doctor, if you haven’t got nothing better to say than that, we are sick of hearing you.”
In appallingly undemocratic fashion, the debate of the bill on the House floor lasted one minute and thirty seconds. It may be difficult to accept the legitimacy of the following written dialogue, but if you doubt me, please see the public record:
Member from upstate New York: “Mr. Speaker, what is this bill about?”
Speaker Rayburn: “I don’t know. It has something to do with a thing called marihuana. I think it’s a narcotic of some kind.”
“Mr. Speaker, does the American Medical Association support this bill?”
Member on the committee jumps up and says: “Their Doctor Wentworth[sic] came down here. They support this bill 100 percent.”
The ramifications of this bill have been rather offsetting and have drastically repaved the landscape of American society. See for yourself:
- Alcohol is far more toxic and lethal than marijuana. A blood alcohol concentration of 0.40 or above (about fifteen or so drinks in a short period of time) can be fatal to the average individual. Comparably, it would take one thousand hits of marijuana to do the same damage, and this is theoretical, since there has never been a marijuana overdose death in history. Sure, you may say that treatment numbers are up, but this is primarily a function of petty crime arrests increasing and judges mandating rehabilitation for the offender.
- We simply cannot afford this any longer. President Obama made it quite clear that we are facing an astronomically high budget deficit in his State of the Union. Forty-four states are facing budget shortfalls of their own in adhering to this policy of prohibition. The FBI prosecuted close to 900,000 people for marijuana-related violations several years ago. That’s more than half of all drug arrests in the United States. The cost? A whopping $40 billion annually to support a drug war that 76% of Americans find to be wasteful and an utter failure. I am not a big fan of taxation, but if this would tip the scale, Harvard Economics professor Jeffrey Miron estimates annual tax revenue upwards of $6 billion from legalization. Goodbye, drug dealers.
- The Portuguese Miracle. Portugal decriminalized possession of all drugs several years ago, and Time reports that it has been a resounding success. Drug use among teens has dropped across the board, while more and more people are actively seeking treatment instead of burrowing underground. Deaths related to more serious drugs, such as heroin have also dropped, but I will quit while I am ahead, since seeking decriminalization of harder drugs in this political climate is certain to get nowhere.
There is plenty more upside to look forward to, such as de-stigmatization of the drug and people being more frank so as to seek medical treatment. It is smart on a social, economic, and intellectual level. The President most recently spoke of “winning the future.” I cannot see how such a future can be won without setting our principles and priorities straight. As Nadelmann ’84 astutely points out, “The worst prohibition, after all, is a prohibition on thinking.”
Photo Credits: WhiteHouse.gov