Currently, New Jersey leaders are considering legalizing the sale and possession of marijuana in addition to permitting the cultivation of marijuana in a person's home.

The lessons being learned in Colorado make it clear that legalizing marijuana is a dangerous proposal that will negatively affect the health and wellness of New Jersey residents. Legalization of medical and recreational marijuana has caused youth to develop low perceptions of risk towards marijuana use. This is being exacerbated by the changing social acceptance and increased visibility and availability through open use by adults and older peers. States like Colorado, which have legalized medical and/or recreational marijuana use, have the highest rates of youth and adult marijuana use in the nation.

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Nationwide, the Numbers Have Dropped. Some Critics Point to a Crackdown Spurred by Governor.

As public acceptance of marijuana use grows in the United States, nationwide arrests for simple possession of pot have dropped in recent years. New Jersey is going in the opposite direction.

Marijuana arrests in the state jumped 10 percent in 2012 and 2013, according to the latest New Jersey State Police Uniform Crime Reports.

In fact, the 24,765 arrests made for possessing small amounts of marijuana in 2013 is the highest number in 20 years, and nearly double the amount in 1993, when the state's population was 12 percent less, based on state police statistics and an analysis by the ACLU of New Jersey. In the five years prior to 2013, arrests had hovered around 22,000.

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This past week has been a memorable week for me for several reasons, but talk of legalizing the substance I enjoy and which has caused the government to ruin me tops the list.

Senator Scutari held a public hearing at the state capitol to explore the issue of marijuana legalization, a precursor to his sponsored legalization bill. Scutari, who as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called the hearing and explained its purpose as "the first step" to introducing his bill (S1896) and "this is the natural next step - to talk about the benefits of legalization and the negative impact prohibition has had."

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TRENTON (AP) - New Jersey's Democratic-controlled Legislature took a step toward a showdown with Gov. Chris Christie over legalized marijuana on Monday.

A state Senate panel convened a hearing on legalizing the drug, and a leading Democratic lawmaker says it's time to bring it out of an underground economy by legalizing, taxing and regulating it.

"I believe our state should lead the way," Democratic state Sen. Nicholas Scutari said. Scutari, who has authored a bill that would legalize, tax and regulate marijuana for people over 21, sketched a scenario in which the drug comes out of what he called a "black market" and gives way to a billion-dollar industry.

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Regarding the Nov. 16 article "Marijuana's in bloom in N.J.," why this headlong rush into legalizing recreational marijuana? The only answer that makes any sense is that legislators see a big pot (pardon the pun) of tax revenue. They are willing to put many of us at risk so that they can have a new source of money to spend.

They claim to be concerned about our health and that is why we've been subjected to countless warnings about the harmful effects of tobacco smoke for the last 40-plus years. Now, not a word about the harmful effects of marijuana smoke. Why? Health issues alone are enough to label the recreational use of marijuana as damaging to your health and should be avoided.

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Columnist L.A. Parker should blame drug prohibition for violence and death, not suburban drug users. Drug addiction is color-blind and impacts rural, suburban and urban areas. Drug prohibition fosters corruption and criminal activity; it's a cure worse than the disease. Switzerland's heroin maintenance program has been shown to reduce disease, death and crime by providing addicts with standardized doses in a clinical setting.

The success of the Swiss program has inspired heroin maintenance pilot projects in Canada, Germany, Spain, Denmark and the Netherlands.

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On Monday, the state Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a first-ever hearing for New Jersey on legalizing marijuana.

Can we just cut through all of the usual nonsense and legalize it once and for all?

It's going to happen, at some point. Medicinal marijuana is already in place in New Jersey - albeit grudgingly on Gov. Chris Christie's part. Public support for full legalization is growing; a summer Fairleigh Dickinson PublicMind poll showed 49 percent in favor and 46 percent opposed.

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Recent heroin drug busts in Trenton underscored a standard relationship between drug dealer and drug addict.

The great truth regarding heroin sales shows that urban area drug problems are directly connected to suburban drug users.

One Trentonian photo in October highlighted this drug exchange theme as arrested city resident Jaishawn Mathis, who is black, faced heroin possession and distribution offenses.

Astonishment existed that Mathis, who had allegedly been shot a month before his arrest (nothing personal just part of street business), had stepped back out on the city's drug playing field. His determination highlights the grab for suburban dollars as those residents find heroin here then hustle back to their bedrooms and dens.

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TRENTON (AP) - New Jersey lawmakers are planning a hearing next week to consider legislation to legalize recreational use of marijuana.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will hear from clergy, health professionals, law enforcement officials, and other policy experts on Monday, Sen. Nicholas Scutari (D., Union) said Monday.

"There is no question that we need to update our archaic drug laws in this country, and the majority of people support regulating, taxing, and legalizing marijuana," Scutari said.

The announcement comes as lawmakers prepare for a lameduck session of the Legislature and Gov. Christie spends time outside New Jersey campaigning for the Republican nomination for president. Marijuana has been legalized for all uses in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska, and for medical use in nearly 20 other states, including New Jersey.

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I'm feeling like Crispus Attucks, Nat Turner, and Malcolm X all rolled up into one. Crispus Attucks is considered the first person to be killed in the Revolutionary War; I don't want to be the first to fall, but I too demand to be on the front lines. Nat Turner took it upon himself to organize a slave revolt; I myself am now calling for a Reefer Revolution. Malcolm X said "by any means necessary"; I think it's necessary to use jury nullification as a means to end the cannabis trials. I feel I'm at a crossroads in life, and all three of these historical figures' ideas are in my THC-enhanced mind.

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I ask and answer this because I'll probably be arrested on Monday October 26 in front of the Ocean County Courthouse for passing out jury nullification awareness literature in defiance of an illegal verbal order issued by Lieutenant Green of the Ocean County Sheriff's Department at the behest of the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office. I feel no remorse for not complying with this unconstitutional order. So I expect to be jailed; the only question is, for how long? How this came to be: Last week, libertarian activist and Fully Informed Jury Association (FIJA) member Jim Babb was ordered to leave the public area in front of the Ocean County Courthouse before being threatened with arrest and told he was being investigated for jury tampering for passing out fija.org-jury rights literature. (Please watch this video: http://tinyurl.com/ ocsherriff)

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Here's a prediction: Marijuana will be legal New Jersey in three years. All that needs to happen is for a reasonable human being to assume the governor's throne, as our current fearless leader, Chris Christie, has repeatedly said he'd never allow anyone to legally blaze a joint in the Garden State. As such, he has vowed to never sign a legalization bill.

And there are bills, for the record. Bills that would seek to either decriminalize or fully legalize marijuana are waiting to be heard.

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Can we be optimistic about New Jersey's future if Democratic legislators care more about potential tax revenue than the dangers in legalizing recreational marijuana? This state's drug epidemic is severe enough without further enticing the young, poor and uninformed with a "gateway drug" to heroin addiction.

Yet, in spite of denials, those promoting marijuana for medical use are also encouraging legalization for pleasure. The potential consequences are dire. How can we discourage experimentation or usage by the young if liberal politicians proclaim it legal and safe.

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In response to the Oct. 14 oped, "Sentence doesn't fit crime" by Ken Wolski, this is why I do not respect the justice system. John Peditto, whose trial begins Oct. 20 in Toms River, was growing 17 plants, not a field of marijuana to sell to school students, and he may receive a prison sentence of 31-plus years?

He didn't shoot, beat up, take hostages, bully or harass anyone and we will have taxpayers paying for 31-plus years of jail time. I hope the jury is smarter than the system. Driving Under the Influence violators don't even do that much time, if any.

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America has the highest incarceration rate in the world. President Obama recently said the U.S. has only 5 percent of the world's population, but has 25 percent of the world's prisoners. What is creating this Incarceration Nation is the War on Drugs, nearly half of which is a war on marijuana. More precisely, it is a war on people who use marijuana.

Take, for example, the case of Jon Peditto, whose marijuana trial is scheduled to begin on Oct. 20 in Toms River. Peditto was found by law enforcement officers to be growing 17 marijuana plants. For this non-violent crime he faces 31 1/2 years in state prison.

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I'm black, so obviously I support this concept that my life matters too. I also grew up in the suburbs of South Jersey, in a two-parent middle class home, believing that I was equal to my suburban white counterparts. I never thought I'd go to prison, especially not for marijuana.

I officially entered the marijuana legalization movement on November 24, 1997. On that morning I was arrested in Bellmawr, NJ, by the Camden County drug task force for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute when a 40-pound package was delivered by Fed-Ex. Many activists start their activism in handcuffs; I was no different - my activism started in earnest after I was arrested. That cold steel around your wrists for marijuana makes people want to change sh*t.

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Despite Soaring Rates of Addiction, Treatment Remains Hard to Access and Prohibitively Expensive

Ashley Gibbons had been holding it together, or so she told herself. Sure, she had sold off her electronics, stolen money from her mother and slept with guys who gave her money. But it wasn't as if she was an actual prostitute: "I didn't go and find random people. I knew them," she said.

She had tried heroin for the first time at 21, four years ago, and for a long while, it remained an occasional thing. But she needed more and more to get high, and, though she held onto her job, pretty soon everything else was falling apart.

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Court Runs Justice Off Road With Vehicle Search Decision

Generally speaking, when I hear stories about the police gaining more power over the citizens they're sworn to protect and serve, I don't like it. I don't like the idea of police officers having unchecked powers, don't like the idea of living at the mercy of the police, don't like the idea of anything resembling a police state.

But when it comes to the state Supreme Court's recent reversal of itself when it comes to probable cause searches of cars, I've got no problem with it.

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Police can now search a vehicle without a warrant if they have probable cause to believe there is contraband or evidence of a crime as long as the circumstances that led to the probable cause are foreseeable and spontaneous.

In other words, police, who are already in an incredible struggle with society regarding use of force, have just assumed more power.

Legal traffic stops can now morph into police in full violation of a motorist's rights based on an officer being pissed off because a person refuses to kiss his pinkie ring. The Supreme Court ruling reverts back to 2009 law but the national issues between police and community are in much more dire conditions now then six years back.

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The end of the second prohibition era draws near. The disastrous consequences of the misbegotten "War on Drugs," with its focus on marijuana, are now widely recognized. More humane approaches to drug use are being implemented as states ease restrictions.

But not if the bitter-enders prevail - as witness Gov. Chris Christie's struggle with the issue in the most recent GOP debate.

President Nixon declared war on drugs in 1971, placing the counter-culture's favored drug, marijuana, on Schedule I of controlled substances. Since then, countless lives have been ruined, not so much by the drug itself, but by the legal regime that followed.

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