Legalize Marijuana

Legalize Marijuana

To the AIDS or cancer patient, marijuana is the plant that fights nausea and appetite loss. To the nutritionist, its seed is second only to the soybean in nutritional value and is a source of cooking oil and vitamins. To the paper or cloth manufacturer, it is the plant that provided much of our paper and clothing for hundreds of years and produces four times more fiber per acre than trees. To the environmentalist, it is the plant that could greatly slow deforestation, restore robbed nutrients by other crops, and help prevent erosion. Unfortunately, to most people in this country, it is a useless plant. Marijuana should be legalized in the United States because it is a plant that could save many lives if it was allowed to. It is important to reverse prejudices, relieve ignorance, and inform people of what this remarkable plant is really like.

As of today the nation stands behind three basic ideas of what to do with marijuana; legalize marijuana, make it legal only as a prescription drug, or keep it as it is, illegal. People who are pro-marijuana argue that it is considerably less harmful than tobacco and alcohol, the most frequently used legal drugs. Furthermore marijuana has never directly caused anyone’s death. People who side with the legalization of marijuana for medical purposes believe that the ends justify the means. But the people who want to keep it illegal think that the medical uses do not outweigh the harmful side effects.

Before deciding whether marijuana should be legal or not, people should know some basic facts about it. In Earleywine’s book Understanding Marijuana he notes “cannabis has become one of the most widespread and diversified of plants. It grows as weed and cultivated plant all over the world in a variety of climates and soils” (27). Marijuana was first cultivated in China around 4000 B.C. It was mainly used as a sedative and analgesic, but today it is commonly used for the “high” or the euphoric feeling it causes. The most active ingredient in marijuana is delta-9-tetrahydrocannibinal commonly referred to as THC, which wasn’t discovered until the 1960s (Earleywine 42). Marijuana became illegal because Harry Anslinger, then Commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, introduced the Marijuana Stamp Tax Act which was passed in 1937. This act prohibited the sale and growth of marijuana. The bill was passed on the grounds that cannabis caused “murder, insanity and death”. But it was Anslinger himself who in 1951 claimed that he had no evidence to support such a thesis (Kubby and Rosenthal 15). Marijuana was made illegal because no one understood why smoking it made people feel the way they did, and because it was associated with Indians and other so called “immoral people.”

Today marijuana is illegal because research has shown some intoxicating effects. Some people who smoke marijuana might feel things such as anxiety, depression, or paranoia lasting up to four hours. Physical effects include reddening of the eyes, dryness of the mouth, a moderate increase in heart rate, or drowsiness. On the other hand, when compared to cigarettes which cause cancer and are one of the biggest contributors to death in the US, marijuana suddenly does not seem so bad. Also, alcohol abuse is one of the major health problems for Americans and for many other countries as well (Kubby and Rosenthal 4). Marijuana buffers the central nervous system, but not any more than alcohol does and it does not produce a considerable amount of tar in the lungs like cigarettes. A joint of marijuana may produce more tar than a cigarette, but on average marijuana users do not consume enough marijuana to surpass the tar build up of a person who smokes a pack of cigarettes a day. Marijuana has not been proven to be physically addictive unlike cigarettes and alcohol. Its use may be psychologically addictive, just as video games or television (Earleywine 33). Many people who are against the legalization of marijuana also feel that by allowing people to smoke, it will be putting the lives of others in danger on the road. In response, we already have laws to catch and punish people who do those kinds of things. If it becomes legal, that doesn’t mean anyone can use it or abuse it, there will still be laws preventing that. These “negative” effects of marijuana are the primary reasons why domestic people, doctors, and politicians want to keep marijuana illegal.

As of late 1990, there were about twelve people who had permission to smoke marijuana for its medical value. Are these the only people who