Pubdate: Wed, 20 Jul 2005
Source: Sun News (Myrtle Beach, SC)
Copyright: 2005 Sun Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/sunnews/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/987
Author:   James E. Dunn
Note: 150 word limit on LTEs
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

LEGALIZING DRUGS WOULD CUT COSTS, CRIME

Since the federal government would be selling these drugs, the many
violent crimes associated with drug dealing and pushing would go down
dramatically.

The Sun News had an informative and insightful article on its
editorial page awhile back. It was with regard to our huge national
illegal drug problem among our youth. The ultra-conservative columnist
William F. Buckley Jr. wrote it.

The illegal drug problem is of tremendous importance among our
youngsters right here in Horry and Georgetown counties.

In the column, Buckley implores this nation to now do what almost all
the other civilized countries in the world have done regarding illegal
drugs: Legalize all drugs for anyone who is 21 or older. He also
recommended that anyone caught selling these illegal drugs to anyone
younger than 21 be sent to prison for a very long time.

More and more European countries have begun to use this approach to
illegal drug control among their youth, particularly after the
outstanding results were analyzed of the few European countries that
tried it in the early part of the 1970s. What they discovered was that
after these formerly illegal drugs were legalized, and then sold by
the various European governments to anyone who was 21 or older:

The severe punishment of the person selling these drugs to minors was
one of the key elements to making this plan work, as few minors
younger than 21 were able to actually obtain and use any of these drugs.

Therefore, the actual usage of illegal drugs dropped precipitously for
people younger than 21 in all of the countries that used this approach.

It dropped dramatically for those who were 21 and older, as well,
mostly because by that age the adolescent curiosity about drugs had
dissipated.

The monetary savings to each government was astronomical. Therefore,
the citizens of each country that employed this new technique had to
pay far less for this travesty by way of taxes. There was no longer
the policing of each country's borders; there was no longer the paying
for the arrest, the conviction and the imprisonment of the drug
"pushers" and many dealers; there was no longer the tremendous
governmental - taxpayer, really - cost of catching, convicting and
imprisoning the drug user.

Illegal drug pushers and users now make up the largest portion of our
national - and S.C. - prison population. The need for more prisons
would diminish radically in this country - and state - with this
change in drug policy.

Since these drugs would be sold in governmental stores, the federal
government - the taxpayer, really - would actually make money on the
changing of our drug laws.

Since the federal government would be selling these drugs, the many
violent crimes associated with drug dealing and pushing would go down
dramatically.

Is there really any good and realistic reason why we don't legalize
these drugs, and then have the government sell them to anyone 21 and
older? 

The writer lives in Myrtle Beach.
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