Legal pot is the new gay marriage
So why on Earth aren't Democrats pushing for it?
American public opinion has been gradually shifting on the question of legalizing marijuana. In the last couple of years, the proportion of the country in support has reached critical mass: In a Gallup poll released Wednesday, fully 64 percent of Americans support legalization — including a majority of Republicans.
It's in many ways quite similar to what happened with gay marriage. However, unlike when the gay marriage public opinion wave started to crest in 2012 and 2013, as of yet few high-profile Democrats have come out for legalization. It's long since time the party came around on this issue — not just on policy or political grounds, but to get out ahead of a more corporate legalization approach.
Now, there are some exceptions, most prominently Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who to his credit introduced a bill to legalize marijuana at the federal level in August. In fact, Booker's bill is considerably more aggressive than even Bernie Sanders' bill from 2015, which would have merely allowed states to legalize marijuana — thus formalizing the quasi-legal status of the eight states and D.C. that have legalized marijuana to varying extents. In comparison, Booker's bill would remove marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act, pressure states into legalizing it, expunge federal marijuana use and possession crimes, allow marijuana convicts in federal prison to petition for resentencing, and create a community reinvestment fund to rebuild places hit hardest by the war on drugs.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
It's a great start. The war on drugs is an abject failure, and it's long since time we treated marijuana more sensibly.
It is honestly rather baffling that more Democrats haven't seized on this. There are few if any political issues with 64 percent support lying around for the taking — especially not ones that are guaranteed to receive little or no Republican support. The political case is further strengthened by the history of 2016, where Hillary Clinton — who refused to support legalization — hemorrhaged critical swing-state votes to the Green Party's Jill Stein and the Libertarian Party's Gary Johnson.
If there's a better or easier way to sell yourself to hippies and libertarians at the same time than legal weed, I certainly haven't heard of it.
But policy matters a lot here too. Marijuana is one of the least dangerous drugs, but it is a drug, and selling drugs like a normal commodity is highly non-ideal. Just like gambling or alcohol, a large bulk of marijuana use tends to come from a tiny minority of users. A large corporation will thus be incentivized to get as many heavy users hooked as early in life as possible and spending as much as possible, by advertising to children and selling cheap Bud Lite-style pot in bulk.
Therefore, a federal marijuana legalization scheme should have sharp regulations on the sale of marijuana, with the deliberate intention of keeping it a small, craft business. That means stuff like very high taxes, to keep prices high (though not so high as to recreate a black market) and use down; a total ban on all advertising; a ban on selling across state lines; and a ban on any business accumulating more than, say, 10 percent of the total marijuana sales in any single state, or 1 percent of the national market, whichever is smaller.
The ideal future would be a lot of artisanal growers selling umpteen zillion different varieties of high-quality craft weed to a population of relatively moderate users — not a future of Big Pot selling bale-sized bags to brain-fried potheads. There will be some people who use too much, of course — but that can't really be helped, given that there are quite a few such people today under prohibition.
This would have the knock-on possibility of helping staunch the opioid crisis. Marijuana's possibilities as a pain reliever are still being explored, but it has shown a ton of promise. It's quite likely that a great many people using opioids for pain relief could instead be prescribed pot — and while it is possible to abuse pot, it is approximately one-thousandth as dangerous as oxycodone, and one-millionth as dangerous as fentanyl. Not only is it far less addictive, it is literally impossible to overdose and die — there has never been a single case of a fatal marijuana overdose in recorded history. If it's possible to displace opioids in this area, it would be a huge public health triumph.
But the best potential effects of all would be on crime and violence — much of it south of the border. Illegal marijuana trafficking is a big profit center for gangs and drug cartels, whose violent conflicts with each other and the governments of Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, and others, have killed tens of thousands of people (though less than it used to be given the spread of legalization and medical marijuana laws). Preliminary studies suggest that the spread of more legal ways to obtain marijuana has resulted in moderate drops in violent crime — especially in southern border states.
It wouldn't abolish the cartels at a stroke, of course — for that you'd probably have to decriminalize harder drugs like heroin and meth, but that's a subject for another post.
All in all, it's a total policy gimme: Claim the political high ground, lay in a new source of significant tax revenue, slow the opioid epidemic, and strike a blow against crime. Democrats need to ditch their inner Nancy Reagan and pick up the political bong.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.
-
Bormio: 'a great Alpine getaway'
The Week Recommends From snowy slopes and hot-spring spas, to high-end food and wine, this Italian town has something to offer everyone
By Asya Likhtman Published
-
Crossword: March 28, 2024
The Week's daily crossword
By The Week Staff Published
-
Sudoku medium: March 28, 2024
The Week's daily medium sudoku puzzle
By The Week Staff Published
-
Trump, billions richer, is selling Bibles
Speed Read The former president is hawking a $60 "God Bless the USA Bible"
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
The debate about Biden's age and mental fitness
In Depth Some critics argue Biden is too old to run again. Does the argument have merit?
By Grayson Quay Published
-
How would a second Trump presidency affect Britain?
Today's Big Question Re-election of Republican frontrunner could threaten UK security, warns former head of secret service
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
'Rwanda plan is less a deterrent and more a bluff'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By The Week UK Published
-
Henry Kissinger dies aged 100: a complicated legacy?
Talking Point Top US diplomat and Nobel Peace Prize winner remembered as both foreign policy genius and war criminal
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Last updated
-
Trump’s rhetoric: a shift to 'straight-up Nazi talk'
Why everyone's talking about Would-be president's sinister language is backed by an incendiary policy agenda, say commentators
By The Week UK Published
-
More covfefe: is the world ready for a second Donald Trump presidency?
Today's Big Question Republican's re-election would be a 'nightmare' scenario for Europe, Ukraine and the West
By Sorcha Bradley, The Week UK Published
-
Xi-Biden meeting: what's in it for both leaders?
Today's Big Question Two superpowers seek to stabilise relations amid global turmoil but core issues of security, trade and Taiwan remain
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published