Reasons for the Legalization of Marijuana

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The "War on Drugs" has been fighting a tough opponent over the past few decades. Aimed at cutting down on drug use and sales, this "war" has brought many negative side effects along with it. Aside from limiting the freedoms of millions of Americans, The War on Drugs has caused many more problems while also managing to fail at drug deterrence and distribution. Since many citizens already back the legalization of marijuana, as demonstrated by Oakland's passing of Measure Z, which makes marijuana related offenses the "lowest priority" to Oakland law enforcement officials (Hill 2004), marijuana should be legalized.

First off, marijuana isn't even that bad of a drug. It is a plant ally and hasn't been proven to do any major harm. Many patients are prescribed medical marijuana for their own personal use to relieve pain. The label on a bottle that contained legally prescribed marijuana says, "To be taken for: cancer, malaria, anorexia, AIDS, chronic pain, spasticity, glaucoma, arthritis, migraines, and any other illness for which marijuana provides relief." If marijuana was legalized, many more people could have easy access to this drug that has been proven to help people. On top of helping people, marijuana isn't linked to nearly as many health concerns as other legal drugs like tobacco and alcohol. The side effects of smoking cigarettes have been causing enormous numbers of deaths every year both from smoking and second hand smoking. In studies done by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the Bureau of Mortality Statistics, we can some proof of the harmlessness of marijuana. The study shows annual American deaths caused by drugs and is topped by tobacco with 400,000 deaths. In second comes alcohol with 100,000 d...

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...s. We must also consider that ending the prohibition of marijuana would save thousands of honest, hard-working citizens time and money from trying to defend themselves that they shouldn't even have to be defending in the first place. It would also save time and money for law enforcement which wastes its time prosecuting people who possess weed, even for personal use, when they could be out on the streets stopping real crime. For these reasons, marijuana needs to become legalized in America.

Works Cited

Goode, Erich. (2004). Legalize it? A bulletin from the war on drugs. Contexts 21, 24.

Hill, Nicole. (2004). Oakland Marijuana Measure in the Bag. Election 2004-UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.

WWW1. The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. Accessed Oct 16, 2004.

WWW2. Legalization of Marijuana. Accessed Nov 11, 2004.

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