Logical Reasoning For the Legalization Marijuana

Logical Reasoning For the Legalization Marijuana

Last year there were more than 695,201 marijuana arrests in the United States. Of those

arrests 87.2% were for possession - not for sale or manufacture of marijuana. There have been

over 11 million marijuana arrests in the United States since 1965. 12.7% of today’s overcrowded

federal prison population is made up of people incarcerated for marijuana offenses, with an

average sentence of 3.25 years.(1)

Even with heroin use on the rise, the police seem to be preoccupied with arresting marijuana

smokers. In 1990 there were over 34,000 emergency room admissions resulting from the use of

heroin and 4 years later, that number had doubled. Many of those patients did not survive. Yet

even though heroin has done much more damage to this society than marijuana has, statistics say

the chances of a heroin dealer being arrested are 1 in 10,900 “deals.”(2)

Is marijuana really a harmful drug? The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy

asked the United States Institute of Medicine to conduct a research to assess the possible health

benefits of marijuana. In March of 1999 the review was made public. The evidence concluded

that the THC in marijuana is effective treatment for symptoms such as pain, nausea, vomiting,

anorexia, and “wasting”, which is the resulting characteristics associated with cancer and AIDS

treatments.(3) Recently it has also has been proven that marijuana reduces muscle pain and

spasticity caused by multiple sclerosis, prevents epileptic seizures, helps bladder control, and

reduces eye pressure and blood flow to the optic nerve in Glaucoma patients.(4) This conclusive

evidence brings up the question why not legalize marijuana as medical drug treatment. Marijuana

has been proven to be less dangerous than cocaine and morphine, two legalized drug treatments

which have been proven to be addictive. According to the Institute of Medicine, there is no

evidence that marijuana use can lead to either addiction or to harder drug use.(6)

The first recorded use of marijuana as medicine was in China in 2727 BC. Marijuana was legal

in the United States until 1937.