"Marijuana is probably the most dangerous drug in America today"- Ronald Reagan
Almost 80 years after marijuana was made illegal by the Marijuana Tax Act in 1937, Washington, Colorado, Alaska and Oregon have legalized recreational marijuana and 23 other states have legalized the use of medical marijuana. In a recent poll, over 50 percent of Americans said that they were not against the legalization of marijuana, so why is it illegal?
Many people assume that if something is illegal, it has to be bad for the general public due to scientific findings and evidence. However, this is not the case for marijuana in America. When the Marijuana Tax Act was passed in 1937, lawmakers did not have the information to make a correct decision if it should be legal or not. Marijuana was made illegal out of fear and racism that has been going on for decades.
The War On Drugs is a prime example of the decades of racism due to the illegalization of drugs. According to the Bureau of Prisons, there are 207,847 people incarcerated in federal prisons and roughly half (48.6 percent) are in for drug offenses. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, there are 1,358,875 people in state prisons, of these prisoners 16 percent are in prison for drug possession. These crimes are mostly non-violent, yet people's lives are ruined for possession.
The federal government has spent $51 billion dollars on the war on drugs, incarcerating one in 11 people in the U.S. 83 percent of arrests for drugs like heroin were for possession, and 88 percent of marijuana arrests were for possession, completely non-violent crimes. Black and Latinas fill federal prisons by 57 percent, even though white people are involved in the same amount of drug activity. This proves that racism that surrounds the war on drugs.
It has been scientifically proven by many research studies that marijuana has multiple medicinal purposes such as treating anxiety, chronic pain, glaucoma, seizures and help cancer patients who are going through chemotherapy to treat nausea. In the U.S., there are over a million registered medical marijuana patients and 2 million residents of the US admit to using marijuana to treat personal health problems. These patients range in all ages and all of these patients benefit from such a simple plant. It is ridiculous that the U.S. government classifies marijuana as a drug that just as harmful as heroin and LSD.
If marijuana was made legal federally and rescheduled to a schedule two drug and could be taxed and regulated, the taxes would create a revenue of billions of dollars. Colorado being the greatest example, since marijuana legalization in Colorado has sold almost a billion dollars worth of marijuana and marijuana products, generating millions of dollars in taxes used to help build schools, parks, and homeless shelters. If America made marijuana legal, imagine what we could do with the revenue from the taxes, it could help us lower our national debt, and create a better America.
So tell me, why shouldn't we legalize?
