To non-smokers - Why is marijuana illegal? Read details please.?

Question

According to editors of the prestigious Lancet British medical journal: "The smoking of cannabis, even long-term, is not harmful to health. ... It would be reasonable to judge cannabis as less of a threat ... than alcohol or tobacco."
REFERENCE: Deglamorising Cannabis. 1995. The Lancet 346: 1241. Editorial. November 14, 1998. The Lancet.

Answer 1

I don't smoke it, but I believe that it is illegal because there is a great deal of money involved in its being illegal.

Legalizing marijuana would mean fewer DEA raids, fewer drug cases in the courts, fewer inmates in the prisons, less demand for the supplies necessary to enforce drug laws, fewer government seizures and auctions of private property, etc.

It would likely benefit the tax payers (and we surely can't have that), but would be a detriment to anyone involved in planning, supplying, or conducting the "war on drugs".

Answer 2

I'm not a non-smoker but the best theory I've heard is:

"William Randolph Hearst had accumulated a chain of newspapers that made him the most influential man in America. He also owned vast timber holdings which fed the paper industry. Lammont Du Pont was his friend and supplied toxic chemicals which were needed for making paper. He was also the spearhead for a fledgling petrochemical industry. Both men stood to loose large if hemp turned the industrial revolution corner, which it looked like it was about to do with the invention of the "decorticator", a far superior machine to Jefferson's hemp break. With this new invention, it appeared that hemp could now be processed quickly enough to be used for paper and plywood instead of trees, and the petrochemical industry was and embarrassment considering you can make the same five hundred biodegradable products from hemp. This was not good news for Mr. Hearst or Mr. Dupont. Henry Ford had already made and fueled a car almost entirely from hemp, and it actually looked as if hemp had the capacity to affect Hearst and DuPont's bottom line.

Hearst ordered all his editors to write scathing stories about marijuana to which they replied, "What's that?" Hearst made the word up because he knew no one would believe scathing stories about hemp. The articles all denigrated Mexicans, African Americans, Jazz Musicians, and the city of New Orleans, suggesting that marijuana use would certainly lead to crime, insanity, and early violent death. After a few years of this bombardment, the country was primed for the marijuana tax act of 1937.

The marijuana tax act was sent through the good old boys network with help from Hearst and Dupont allies until it was signed into law by President Roosevelt on August 2, 1937. A slam dunk for the corporate giants, and a great lose for America. The bill actually charged a one hundred dollar an ounce tax on any commercial hemp transaction, which made American hemp noncompetitive. All hemp used by America had to be imported, that is until 1942 when our supply was cut off by the war, and the Government started it's "Hemp for Victory" campaign.

The plan called for the planting of three hundred thousand acres of hemp, and for building seventy-one processing plants... a strange position for our government to be in only four years after taxing it to death. As the end of the war drew near, the government's position on hemp flip-flopped yet again. Over night this war time wonder plant had once again become the demon weed from hell...

On November 2, 1951, Congress passed the Boggs act, increasing the penalties for all narcotics violations. They also included marijuana on the list of narcotics which was the beginning of a whole other problem. All of a sudden our jails were filling up with middle class kids caught smoking pot. Now there was a whole counter culture revolving around smoking pot, and by the mid seventies everyone was thinking it would only be a few more years till the government came to it's senses and repealed the marijuana prohibition. They must have been pipe dreaming." - From www.viperrecords.com

Answer 3

i looked for an answer on the Internet, i am not saying i agree with it being legalized, i was just curious at to why it is illegal. Most feel the same about it, but this is the answer i choose to use. Marijuana is illegal because the US Government sees it as a non-taxable good. They know that if they legalize it, then it can be taxed, but nobody would buy it legally because of the tax raising the price. People have their own resources, so, why buy it legally for more money when it's able to be bought illegally for less?

Answer 4

Yes, I think marijuana (or pakalolo, as we call it in Hawaii) should be legalized. All the research I have done seems to rule that marijuana is less harmful than alcohol or tobacco; and it has many medicinal properties. In Hawaii and some states on the mainland, it is legal to possess and grow marijuana (enough for individual use) if you have a medical condition that warrants it.

Answer 5

Well, first of all, I have nothing against weed...but I don't believe that long-term exposure to ANY contaminates won't be harmful in some way.

As to why it's illegal, I imagine it's because our elected legislators have made it illegal. There's not necessarily any perfect or flawed logic required to make something legal or illegal.

There's a lot of silly, worthless laws out there.

Answer 6

Smoker often times I smoke as in lots of circumstances as a pair of circumstances in step with day, yet will in lots of circumstances take breaks from it the place i do no longer smoke at prepared on a on an identical time as. i've got dated the two people who smoke and non people who smoke, would not quite make a distinction to me. i visit declare that people who smoke are generally way cooler and contain lots much less drama.

Answer 7

I hear it's illegal b/c government can't find a way to tax it... but that makes no sense. You could tax it just like cigerettes or alcohol (they are naturally grown, too). Also, if it was legal, that would cut down on street dealing. Why buy illegally if you can go to the store and buy it?

Answer 8

It has been known for a long time that MJ is less addicive, harmful and dangerous than tobacco or alcohol, and a stoned person is definitely less annoying than a drunk one!! But these laws aren't made according to reason, as we would all like to have it, but to tradition and bias.

Answer 9

I seem to recall that it actually has to do with the cotton industry and rope making. You have heard the expression "smoking rope?" Back in the day, rope was often made of hemp. I think that it was actually superior to cotton rope for performance at sea. The cotton lobby intervened and the rest is history.

Answer 10

I'm sorry but that's crap.

Cannabis contains upto 10x the amount of benzopyrene that tobacco contains. That's the number one cause of cancer in smokers by the way.

It's also a hallucinagenic in small doses. There's no real way to police it either. How would you tell someone was smoke-driving and not just smoking tobacco?