Is marijuana decriminalization a step in the right direction or a crafty trick to widen the net of the Drug Warriors?

Several people, spearheaded by Hunter Thompson, attacked the current strategy of decriminalized pot as “another trick.”
– High Times, March 1977

Nixon lied to schedule Ganja #1 – Lies are not Laws

Richard Milhouse Nixon to Raymond P. Shafer”

Pot Decriminalization Timeline

1920: The British government passes the Dangerous Drugs Act, which controls the sale of cannabis tinctures. “Indian Hemp” is added to the Act in 1925.

to

2009 – August: Argentina legalizes personal possession of small amounts of marijuana. “Each individual adult is responsible for making decisions freely about their desired lifestyle without state interference,” the Court determined. “Private conduct is allowed unless it constitutes a real danger or causes damage to property or the rights of others.” This echoes the harm principle arguments made by Malmo-Levine and others that failed to persuade the Supreme Court of Canada in 2003.

Celebrity Stoners: American High Society

In reality some broken laws are more important to address than other broken laws. But that should be a pragmatic concern based on resources, harm/cost to society, and maintaining order. Once you start to make lists of which laws are more important than other laws, there will be problems. Plus, can’t we just assume that a first degree felony is more important to prosecute than a 3rd degree felony? That a 3rd degree felony is more important to prosecute than a class A misdemeanor, and so on…? In other words, the seriousness of the crime should be the guidepost for its priority of being enforced (insofar as such a priority exists).

When selling some leaves is the same degree of seriousness as rape and murder, the problem is with the law in and of itself. the solution should be to change the law, not foster more disrespect for it. I don’t want to have a system where drug laws are kept on the books and there’s merely an unenforceable understanding that in most circumstances such laws will be declined to be enforced. As a lawyer, I simply can’t abide such a system. It makes a mockery of the law. of course, so does having people locked up for lengthy sentences for having touched a leaf. But one legal mockery should not be replaced with another.

Even if there is a policy statement that drug sale/possession should be the lowest priority prosecutions when in full compliance with state law, the feds will still spend resources investigating such crimes (and they are still federal crimes no matter what the states do per the Supremacy Clause), and they will still bring prosecutions just to remind people of this fact. So maybe federal drug prosecutions will drop by 10% but they will increase in arbitrariness. Defendants will not be able to enforce the policy statement to get a drug charge dismissed, and people will have to presume that they are all at risk of federal prosecution no matter what state law is, and no matter what the “least important prosecution” policy of the federal government is.

Here’s the question – would you commit a federal crime and risk going to federal prison based on nothing more than an internal DOJ policy statement that says federal prosecution of that crime is “not a high priority”? You can’t assert that policy as an affirmative defense at trial.

Maybe the president has authority to staff the DOJ as he sees fit and he can set it up so that the entire DOJ controlled substances prosecution division consists of one unpaid intern. All other Assistant US Attorneys are transferred to other divisions of the DOJ.

That’s what I’d do if I were president (among many other things to end drug prohibition). I see no reason why the president wouldn’t have sole authority over how the DOJ is staffed. It’s an agency of the executive branch.

The other thing I thought was that law should try to keep cartels,gangs and the criminal element in general out of medical Cannabis. They will only bring crime and violence to this, not to mention higher prices in my veiw. We want medical cannabis to not be ruined by those in crime.

Guess we’ll wait and see if any legally operating dipensaries get raided, and what evidence would be brought against any raided.