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Arguing
a Position on Drugs
Legalizing Naturally Occurring Drugs
by
A Elbert
Imagine the following scenario: a 12-year-old
boy and his friends watch a movie that makes them think heroin is pretty
cool.
They pool their cash and hit the street.
It takes quite a while, but eventually they find a dealer. The dealer
doesn’t care that they are
twelve as long as they have the cash. In
fact, they are young enough that they could easily be turned into future
business for the dealer.
He gives them a larger quantity than normal for
the amount of cash they have, just on the off chance that they’ll come
back for more.
You can insert any illegal drug you like
into this situation, the outcome is likely to be the same. Now imagine
that the heroin is legal.
It is sold in a special store, like a liquor
store, where I.D. is checked at the door. The 12-year-old and his
friends can’t get in.
The odds of finding someone old enough to go
in for them are not good. The penalties for contributing to a minor
are stiffer than
for alcohol and not many want to take that chance.
Drugs that occur naturally in plants and
fungi, or are refined from these natural sources should be legalized.
This includes marijuana,
mushrooms of the genera Panaeolus and Psilocybe,
mescaline and all mescaline-containing cacti, heroin and other opiates,
cocaine and coca leaves.
In addition to being legalized, they must be regulated
in a strict manner. The law would have to include a minimum age requirement
for purchase,
penalties for contributing to a minor, penalties
for minor in possession, and penalties for driving under the influence.
It would also have to
include standards for potency and purity for
safety reasons, and allow the sale of the drugs to be taxed.
Most people believe that these drugs are
illegal because they are dangerous. This is simply not true.
The first law against opium
was passed in 1875 in San Francisco and only
applied to smoking opium. It was still legal in all other forms.
“Only the smoking of
opium was outlawed, because that was a peculiarly
Chinese habit and the laws were specifically directed at the Chinese. The
white
people in the communities feared that Chinese
men were luring white women to have sex in opium dens” (Keel, Drug Law
Timeline).
Cocaine laws have a similar racist twist:
Cocaine was outlawed because of fears that superhuman
"Negro Cocaine Fiends" or "Cocainized Niggers" (actual terms used by
newspapers in the early 1900's) take large amounts
of cocaine which would make them go on a violent sexual rampage and rape
white women. There is little evidence that any
black men actually did this, if only because it would have been certain
death.
The United States set a record in 1905 with 105
recorded lynchings of black men. At the same time, police nationwide switched
from .32 caliber pistols to .38 caliber pistols
because it was believed that the superhuman "Negro Cocaine Fiend" could
not be
killed with the smaller gun. (Schaffer, Basic
Facts About the War on Drugs)
Marijuana suffered the same fate as opium
and cocaine. In 1937, “Marijuana was outlawed...as a repressive measure
against
Mexican workers who crossed the border seeking
jobs during the Depression” (Schaffer, Basic Facts About the War on Drugs).
All of these laws were passed out of fear and
ignorance. People believed these drug induced crimes happened often,
but there is
no evidence that any of these incidents actually
occurred.
If these drugs were made legal, they could
be controlled. People are doing them anyway and as long as they are
illegal, their use
is completely unregulated. As mentioned
before, with proper laws and penalties, younger people would have a much
more difficult time
getting a hold of these drugs. Some people
might question the effects that a using parent would have on their children.
But in countries
where some of these drugs are decriminalized,
the users are healthier, they are gainfully employed and they have stable
families that are
well adjusted and healthy (Schaffer, Basic Facts
About the War on Drugs).
Another good reason for legalization is
the shaky basis of the original laws. According to the Drug Enforcement
Administration (DEA),
marijuana is a gateway drug. This belief
has never
been proven by reliable scientific testing and
is based on a comment by Henry Anslinger before Congress in the 1950's,
that marijuana use
led to use of other drugs, which was contradictory
to a statement he made in 1937. “Harry Anslinger, then head of the
Federal Bureau of
Narcotics testified before Congress and was asked
specifically if there was any association between the use of marijuana
and the use of
harder drugs. He replied specifically that there
was no such connection and that the users of the different types of drugs
commonly did not
associate with each other” (Schaffer, Basic Facts
About the War on Drugs). Mr. Anslinger changed his answer after he
realized that his
old motives were no longer acceptable.
Finally, most people would argue that these
drugs are illegal because they are dangerous. This is simply not
true. The average number of
drug-related deaths in the United States is about
4,500 per year. Compare this to 80,000 deaths per year for alcohol
and 390,000 per year
for tobacco (add another 50,000 for second hand
smoke). Forty-five hundred for all hard drugs combined doesn’t seem
as bad compared
to those numbers. “There has never been
a recorded death due to marijuana at any time in US history” (Schaffer,
Basic Facts About the War on Drugs).
In conclusion, you can see that most of
the reasons that these drugs are illegal are unfounded and invalid. Legalization
would decrease
the availability to young people, the original
laws were founded on racist principles, and these illegal drugs don’t cause
nearly as many deaths
as the very legal substances, alcohol and tobacco.
Works Cited
U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. “Drug Information”.
1999-2002. .
Keel, Robert. Drug Law Timeline.
Schaffer, Clifford A. Basic Facts About the War
on Drugs.
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