Move over Amsterdam. Washington and Colorado just tore down the floodgates to marijuana legalization. Referendums in each state approved the use of marijuana for recreational use.
That’s right, recreational use. No prescriptions. Not even back-alley dealing. The today-sucks-pass-me-the-pipe kind of smoking is now legal in those two states.
Well, except for the pesky feds. The Drug Enforcement Agency said last week it’s arresting anyone with marijuana regardless of the state law. That’s because the U.S. still says weed is illegal.
And the U.S. government has the backing of the Constitution on this one. The Supremacy Clause says when federal and state law conflict, the feds win.
But there are ways around that. Newly re-elected President Barack Obama could tell the Justice Department to back off in those two states. He’s done it before.
Obama instructed the justice department to stop enforcing the Defense of Marriage Act, a federal law banning same-sex marriages. That, in part, helped states like Washington, Maryland and Maine to approve same-sex marriage in their states this past election.
If Obama is the president of the people, he should let the people’s will be done. Just like the tide is turning in the battle for same-sex marriage rights, a similar tide is ushering in an age of marijuana proliferation.
The question is if Obama will allow it to happen.
Obama promised to allow states to make up their own minds about marijuana. However, under his presidency, the Justice Department has raided more than 200 medical marijuana dispensaries in states that approve medical use. Colorado has been among those hardest hit.
He should live up to his promises and allow marijuana freedom. The war against marijuana has failed. It’s costing too much money and ruining too many lives because of arrests. Just look at the numbers.
Marijuana accounted for nearly half of all drug arrests in 2011, according to the FBI uniform crime reports. Eighty-eight percent of those arrests were for possession.
Or look at the broader arrest picture. Marijuana possession arrests outnumbered all violent crime arrests by more than 130,000. A total of 663,032 people were arrested for possessing marijuana.
Marijuana isn’t destroying lives. Antiquated laws forcing casual pot smokers through the legal system is ruining lives – 10,769,582 lives to be exact.
Think of the money struggling state budgets would save by not arresting pot smokers and running them through the court system. Think of the lives that wouldn’t be permanently stained with arrests on their records.
Or think of the money that could be made by taxing and regulating the sale of marijuana. Washington estimates $2 billion in revenue from marijuana sales in the next five years.
Imagine what Louisiana could do with an extra $2 billion. We probably wouldn’t be shutting down hospitals, and we probably wouldn’t be laying-off teachers.
It’s time for the nation to accept that the war on drugs has been an abysmal failure. But we can change that. Obama can change that. He just has to respect the will of the people he serves.
