Wise To Legalize? Essay, Research Paper
1) Here in the United States a war is being fought, this war has been going on for nearly a century in our country alone, this war is one that cannot be won by the U.S. government unless it finally realizes its mistake and legalizes the drug which we call marijuana.
Fighting the drug war costs the American people 28 billion tax dollars every year to enforce a law which restricts the rights of the people in the U.S. to choose what they want to do when they are in their own home. This figure doesn t even take into consideration the many families that have been torn apart because of the consequences that are involved in the using of marijuana.
2) a) If marijuana were to be legalized, the American people would save 10 billion dollars in federal enforcement, 10 billion in state and local enforcement, 8 billion in other enforcement costs, another 6 billion dollars a year would be saved because of the value of stolen property that is associated with drug use, and benefit around 12.5 billion from taxes. That totals to an unbelievable sum of 46.5 billion dollars, which could be saved by simply legalizing something that should be legal anyway.
b) Quality of life is really put down because of the fact that marijuana is illegal. Because it is illegal it sets children away from their parents because the children are doing something that is illegal for everyone, whereas alcohol, which may be illegal for that young person to consume is legal for the parent, therefore it is not frowned upon as much as marijuana is.
c) Marijuana has been a part of the American culture since it was first colonized. The first Europeans to sail over here had ropes, bibles, clothes, and maps that were all made from hemp. Both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson advocated a hemp-based economy. Marijuana has been used as an intoxicant in the United States since the 1920 s.
d) Marijuana has never been the cause of one single overdose. It is true however, that alcohol, which is legal at the age of 21 in this country kills 30,000 people each year directly, this figure doesn t even include the number of people killed in alcohol related automobile accidents. Another great example is that of tobacco, it too is legal yet it kills 400,000 each year, that s over 1,000 people everyday!
e) The laws on marijuana right now are absolutely ludicrous, they restrict the rights of millions of American adults whose only wish is to be able to relax in their home and consume marijuana while not hurting anybody else in the process.
f) Because of the laws which are now put on marijuana in the U.S. right now, we are not able to grow hemp. If our farmers were able to grow hemp, this country s farm economy would rise by leaps and bounds in the next years afterwards because of the unlimited possibilities of the fiber which we call hemp.
3) a) This is definitely a national problem because we spend 10 billion federal tax dollars every year to enforce this law.
b) This problem is constitutional because it is restricting our constitutional right to privacy.
Bibliography
1) Legalization: A Debate, Eliot Marshall, Chelsea House Publishers: 1988
2) Drugs and The Law, Neil A. Grauer, Chelsea House Publishers: 1988
3) Marijuana, William Dudley, Greenhaven Press, Inc: 1999