Pubdate: Thu, 26 Sep 2002
Source: Carillon, The (CN MB)
Copyright: 2002 The Carillon
Contact:  http://www.thecarillon.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2340
Author: Chris Buors

TAKING DRUGS A VICE, NOT A CRIME

Dear Sir:

Someone ought to tell Provencher MP Vic Toews that sending moral messages 
with the coercive force of the state is called a theocracy. Drug taking is 
a vice, not a crime or a medical disorder. There is no law against 
abortion, adultery or suicide, does that mean the government is sending a 
message to the youth that those activities are sanctioned by society and 
the prime minister wants everybody to give them a try?

I want to commend the Senate for standing up to the moralizers. It was a 
mistake to raise the age for engaging in vice to 18 in the first place. Do 
you really want your teens to get their moral lessons in life from their 
peers after they have left home? Mr. Toews, I want first crack at teaching 
my kid the evils of over-indulgence when s/he gets drunk, stoned or smokes 
tobacco for the first time.

How are children ever supposed to learn responsibility for vice if we do 
not allow them a few mistakes while they are at home? Ben Franklin was a 
printer's apprentice at age 12. Society did not molly coddle teens less 
than 100 years ago when chores and responsibility went hand in hand.

To reiterate my opinion, it is a mistake to do so now! "Vices are not 
crimes" said Lysander Spooner in his classic 1875 essay. In vice the very 
essence of crime, the harming of another individual or their property-is 
wanting.

Mr. Toews ought not confuse the rule of law with the will of the tyrant. 
Thomas Jefferson left mankind with the key natural rights principle, that 
laws aren't legitimate just because a government says they are. Nor are 
laws legitimate because they are the result of a democratic process. At 
various times, it has been perfectly legal for governments to steal 
property, to suppress free speech, to censor newspapers and to murder 
people. The worst tyrants could usually point to some legal basis for their 
actions.

To be legitimate, laws must conform to moral principles. They must support 
each individual's equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of 
happiness. All so-called drug criminals are political criminals, according 
to Jefferson and Spooner.

I urge Vic Toews to put drug prohibition to the four cardinal virtues test 
of St. Thomas Aquinas. Prudence, temperance, justice and fortitude are 
those virtues. Drug prohibition fails on all accounts.

The Special House Committee on the Non-Medicinal Use of Drugs is Orwellian 
to say the least. The ceremonial aspect of drug taking is as old as mankind 
is itself. The British and Japanese are more up front and call their drug 
taking the "tea ceremony."

That will never see the light of day in the House of Commons "looking out 
for special interest's committee." Restore our natural right to drugs, all 
of them. It is a right owned by mankind since time began.

I will be happy to debate Mr. Toews on the issues of patents, prescription 
rights and prohibition, the triple Ps of drug control, any time, any place.

Chris Buors Libertarian Candidate for Rossmere provincial riding Marijuana 
Party Candidate for Winnipeg South
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom