Pubdate: Thu, 26 Dec 2013
Source: Texarkana Gazette (TX)
Copyright: 2013 Texarkana Gazette
Contact:  http://www.texarkanagazette.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/976

URUGUAY DOES A FIRST ON MARIJUANA LEGALISATION

Uruguay has volunteered to be the canary in the cannabis
field.

The small-population 3.4 million-Latin American nation has voted to
legalize the growth and sale of marijuana.

The country's senate narrowly, 16 to 13, approved a law allowing
individuals over 18 to buy up to 40 grams - just over 1.4 ounces - a
month from state licensed dealers. Individuals also have the
alternative of growing up 1.06 pounds of pot for their own use. The
price is likely to be around $1 a gram.

The commercial planting, harvesting and sale will be under the control
of a state Institute for the Regulation and Control of Cannabis. Sales
will be limited to Uruguayan nationals 18 and older, to head off the
possibility of becoming a drug tourism destination, and exports will
be prohibited.

Uruguay's action is part of a growing sense that the U.S. war on drugs
has been a dangerous and expensive failure that has cost the lives of
thousands and fostered an atmosphere of lawlessness. Even in Uruguay,
which was never a major producer or consumer, saw drug related
homicides rise from one in five to one in three over the decade.

Shortly before he left office, Mexican President Vicente Fox, who
battled unusually powerful and violent drug cartels, became an
outspoken advocate for legalizing drugs, especially marijuana whose
cultivation he said he would take up if it ever became legal.

Diego Canepa, the chief of staff to Uruguayan President Jose Mujica,
told The Wall Street Journal, "The war on drugs has been a failure in
Latin America. It's been seen that the U.S. has given the dollars and
we've given the bodies."

The Uruguayan experiment will test several theories put forward by
advocates of legalization here and elsewhere. Proponents say that
legalization will take much of the profit out of cultivation and thus
the incentive for violence. The sale of marijuana at token prices will
cut down on petty crime. And both taken together will undermine the
drug cartels.

The United States should monitor the Uruguayan experiment in the
spirit of trying to learn something, not to discredit legalization.
Our prison system has become ridiculously costly housing inmates given
long sentences for minor drug infractions and in areas out West where
marijuana has become legal under state law, if not federal, the
foundations of civilization seem to have survived-at least so far.

Uruguay may have much to teach us.

Scripps Howard News Service 
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MAP posted-by: Jo-D