This election day, five state ballots — Arizona, California, Maine, Massachusetts and Nevada — will contain initiatives to end statewide cannabis prohibition and institute a taxed and regulated market for the plant.
An additional four states — Arkansas, Florida, Montana and North Dakota — will vote on the establishment of a medical marijuana system through which patients with a qualifying condition and a doctor’s recommendation can obtain access to cannabis.
Marijuana continues to be federally classified as a Schedule 1 substance under the Controlled Substances Act implemented by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA); other Schedule 1 substances include heroin, LSD and Ecstasy.
States are increasingly flexing their autonomy by opting for more liberal cannabis policies. By adopting such changes, they are leading the nation toward one of the most sensible, humane and economically fruitful policy reforms of the past few decades.
One has to merely scratch beneath the surface of the last eight decades of propaganda and intentionally misleading rhetoric to recognize the fairness of cannabis prohibition.
For one thing, if the likely purpose of drug policy is to prevent the abuse of harmful drugs, it seems odd that cannabis should be prohibited while considerably more harmful drugs are legally obtained.
Alcohol, for example, is fatal in large quantities, increases the risk of violence and has the high potential to create physical dependence, yet it is legally bought and sold in a regulated market in every state, according to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
Cannabis use, on the other hand, has no positive correlation with increased violence, and for a Schedule 1 drug, it has a remarkably low risk of physical dependence and an even lower risk of overdose, according to a study published by Scientific Reports.
Despite tens of thousands of alcohol-induced deaths each year, there has never been a recorded instance of fatal overdose from cannabis, according to WebMD.
These facts are neither meant to paint cannabis as harmless nor to demonize the responsible adult use of alcohol; they are simply meant to point out the absurdity of punishing adults for choosing what is by every measure a safer substance.
Despite the federal government’s insistence that cannabis has no accepted medical benefits, studies have shown that the plant alleviates the symptoms of a variety of ailments including cancer, Crohn’s disease, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), epilepsy, HIV/AIDS, dystonia, Tourette syndrome, arthritis and many more.
Patients undergoing chemotherapy have reported that cannabis relieves their nausea, loss of appetite and loss of sleep.
It has been shown to reduce the intensity and frequency of seizures, to relieve chronic pain and to reduce inflammation.
Few other substances have had such a broad range of medical benefits with such a low level of risk while being so stigmatized by the media, politicians and society at large.
This stigma, when enshrined into criminal code, has brought about some fairly damaging consequences in the United States.
Of the 650,000 marijuana arrests that took place in 2015, a large majority were for simple possession, according to the Drug Policy Alliance.
Like the war on drugs in general, marijuana prohibition has proven to be a shining example of racial bias in the criminal justice system.
Even though rates of cannabis use between white and black Americans are fairly consistent, black Americans are 3.73 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession, according to “The War on Marijuana in Black and White,” a report by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Furthermore, prohibition has been an enormous waste of time and resources in the Unites States, as federal and state law enforcement collectively spend about $3.6 billion per year enforcing marijuana laws.
Conversely, taxing and regulating recreational cannabis brings an enormous opportunity for state revenue and overall economic improvement.
In an article for the Washington Post, Christopher Ingraham shows that Colorado’s cannabis industry generated $121 million in tax revenue and created 18,000 new jobs in 2015 alone.
This revenue primarily goes toward public education and maintaining the state’s regulatory infrastructure.
Thus far, every state that has chosen to regulate cannabis has also imposed a sales tax on cannabis, giving them the ability to capitalize on ending prohibition and can more easily tend to their own budgetary needs, according to ThinkProgress’s Deputy Economic Policy Editor Alan Pyke.
One popular argument for opposing legalization is that the youth will be adversely affected by greater exposure to cannabis.
In fact, the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey conducted by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment shows that teen marijuana use has not increased since the state legalized marijuana, and that the rate of teens using marijuana in Colorado is below the national average.
This isn’t conclusive proof that cannabis legalization reduces teen use, but it shows there is no conclusive evidence that legalization increases among minors.
Intuitively, these findings make sense; unlike drug dealers in the underground market, licensed “budtenders” are legally required to check customers’ IDs.
Regardless of how many of these initiatives succeed this Election Day, it is indisputable that marijuana policy reform in the United States has reached a turning point.
Although less than half of all Americans supported cannabis legalization in 2008, 61 percent now support the cause, and that number continues to climb, according to Forbes Magazine.
As we move forward with this process, it is vital that the national discourse on the legalization of marijuana is compassionate, practical and honest.
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