Adam Nagourney in the New York Times was not paying much attention the first time California voters fought back against the drug war:
Washington has generally looked the other way as a growing medical marijuana industry has prospered here and in 14 other states and the District of Columbia, but Mr. Holder’s position — revealed in a letter this week to nine former chiefs of the Drug Enforcement Administration that was made public on Friday — made explicit that legalizing marijuana for recreational use would bring a whole new level of scrutiny from Washington.
To say that the Federal Government has “generally looked the other way” as medical marijuana has been introduced in over a dozen states is a fairly big misreading of the history. Previous to Obama, both the Clinton and Bush Administrations aggresively targeted medical marijuana providers in all states where it was legal. Under Obama, the DOJ publicly promised that they’d leave the states alone, but they haven’t lived up to that pledge. Even Congress has been unable to pass legislation that would’ve made it impossible to use federal resources to undermine state medical marijuana laws (side note: both Rick Larsen and Dave Reichert voted to continue to have the feds come into Washington to undermine our medical marijuana laws).
It’s worth pointing this out because Nagourney makes it sound as if this time it’ll be different. It won’t. As Dan Riffle points out in this post, the Federal Government would be powerless to overturn a successful vote in California to remove the state-level penalties on marijuana (even if whack-job Scientology-promoting sheriffs believe that they make the laws). Their only option is the enforce the law themselves, something that they have neither the manpower – or the political will – to accomplish.
Even so, it’s hard to know exactly how it will play out if Proposition 19 passes. Just because the Federal Government doesn’t appear to have much of a leg to stand on doesn’t mean that they’ll back down. It will certainly trigger some kind of a fight, but just as with medical marijuana, the will of the people and the forces of the market will eventually outlast it. But that’s still only part of what we’ll see if this domino falls.
What I think will be more interesting is to see what occurs outside of our borders. One of the particularly egregious aspects of our drug war is how effectively we’ve been able to force other countries to keep their marijuana laws in line with ours. In the recent ACLU forum, Rick Steves provided his perspective on this, noting that some countries enforce their marijuana laws solely to retain favored trade status with the U.S. If the U.S. isn’t able to maintain that level of control over one of its own states, it’s likely to change the perspective of those outside the U.S. looking in.
If it passes, other states will try the same thing two years from now. It could be a powerful get out the vote issue for young people. Just in time for the presidential election.
@1
It will be. And if Democrats are smart, they’ll get it on the ballot even in states where it’s not as likely to pass – just to drive up the youth vote.
That would be true Lee but I think they are afraid to do so. Doing the right think and not sending young people, especially young minority males, to jail would be a big step in improving race relations.
Lee said Their only option [for the Feds] is the enforce the law themselves, something that they have neither the manpower – or the political will – to accomplish.
Probably true. But the Feds will still have their net in place and will continue to ensnare the occasional victim and proceed to make an example out of them, thereby making sure that their income stream continues.
In my view, the entire drug war continues because it provides unaccountable income (and free drugs) to law enforcement agencies across the United States.
People seems shocked to hear that the Mexican Army and police are involved in the drug business. Do they think that it is different here? Who’s being naive now, Kay?
We also cannot forget that the militarized-security industrial complex is a giant pig, sucking up massive amounts of revenue. Forfeiture laws and rules are predicated on the drug wars being fought to insure revenue generation. Of course the Feds will continue to fight, forcing local agencies, to engage in the battles, to garner their share of the wealth.
Hi Lee.
You’re a brave man. I’m afraid if I read anything more from “Ad Nag”, my head will explode.
spyder @ 5
I’ve read a lot of science fiction. I loved Harry Harrison’s Stainless Steel Rat stories.
One stop for his protagonist is a prison planet. The laws were such that everyone was guilty of something. So the whole population was in prison.
I think about that story a lot. When I was a kid, it seemed ridiculous. These days, not so much.
What the Feds will do after prop 19 passes is to target producers. They are the soft targets in the system. Once it becomes clear that producing marijuana will still get you tossed in prison, they will go underground. This will reduce the supply of legally-produced weed, continuing the profitability of illegal weed produced in Mexico.
Which, really, is all the Feds want to accomplish. Maintain the illegal trade so they have something to fight, and a justification for the DEA’s huge budget.