Arguments Against Decriminalization

Keeping drugs illegal will only carry on the on-going drug related cycle: people get caught with possession of drugs, their third time getting caught they get a sentence, go to prison, come out,

Decriminalization of drugs is not the same thing as legalization, not endorsing the use of drugs but instead attempting a different approach at the stop of drug use. Drug dealers and manufacturers are still incarcerated, while drug addicts are given treatment instead of punishment. Should Canada decriminalize drugs and instead treat drug addiction as a health issue? Two percent of the population currently report using hard drugs (cocaine, heroin, speed, etc.) within the past year. Taking into consideration that this number is slowly climbing and that most drug users may not admit to using while the harsh punishments still exist, it is clear that this nation has a drug problem that has no foreseeable end. Canada would benefit from the decriminalization

Proponents on the legalization of drugs believe if drugs were to become legal; the black market worth billions of dollars would become extinct, drug gangsters would disappear, addicts would stop committing crimes to support their habit and the prison system would not be overwhelmed with a problem they cannot defeat. The decriminalization of drugs will only make illegal drugs cheaper, easier to get and more acceptable to use. “The U.S. has 20 million alcoholics and alcohol misusers, but only around 6 million illegal drug addicts. If illegal drugs were easier to obtain, this figure would rise”(Should Drugs be decriminalized? No.November 09, 2007 Califano Joseph A, Jr).”

There is a debate in the American government system on how to handle the use of drug and alcohol. In the 1960s drugs were uprising along with youth rebellion and in 1971 Nixon declared a “War on Drugs” (Citation a brief). This name is not to be confused with the band War on Drugs, but the term is still popularly used to describe the policies that Government officials are making regarding drugs and alcohol. This debate got reheated when Colorado legalized weed for medical and recreational use, followed by several other states. There has slowly been a shift in mindset from, “alcoholics are drug addicts are all criminals and we (the law) should throw them in jail” to “addiction is a disease.” Even the way that addicts/alcoholics are treated has changed to treatment centers with specialist versus throwing them in the hospital to detox and hoping for a change. Policies that are shifting the penalty from incarceration to treatment reflect these changes and help the individual suffering from the disease to get back on their feet. The war on drugs rings on, but changes are being made.

The fact that the United States treats drug use as a terrible crime instead of treating it as a physical problem or illness, and the drug problem is still not going away, shows that the United States is going about drug abuse all wrong. The United States has over 25% of the world's incarcerated population and over half of those are in prison for drug abuse/distribution. Other countries have decriminalized drugs and have seen an extremely positive difference in the drug abuse problem. Therapeutic drug treatments can be offered as an option to drug abusers so they feel safe and not afraid or angry of what is happening. The United States needs to find a new policy on drug abuse because the current policy has failed.

According to the webpage DrugPolicy.org, under the section titled “Approaches to decriminalize drug use” it states that the best solution to reduce the number of people being swept into jail or prison is to enact various forms of decriminalizing drug use and possession. “Decriminalizing is the removal of criminal penalties for drug

The continued, growing supply, and demand for powerful psychoactives proves this. To lie to the populace in order to fulfill a personal view of what society should be is unjustifiable, as the U.S. is a democratic republic, and one man’s views are theoretically never allowed to become law. Both of these realities pale in comparison with the actions taken by the government to attempt to rehabilitate the addict. To illustrate this point some facts must be stated. In 2013, 98,200 people were currently imprisoned for drug related crimes. This is 51% of the total federal prison population. Of the nearly 4 million people on probation at the end of 2012, 25% had a drug charge as their most serious offense. The amount of money that would be saved, and the number of people who would still be living upstanding productive lives if drug charges had never been criminalized is almost incalculable (People Sentenced For Drug Offenses In The US Correctional System). Additionally, according to the NCADD, 8% of the U.S. population used an illicit drug in the past 30 days. 20% has used a prescription for nonmedical purposes (NCADD). In effect, this means that between 20 and 30% of the population could be imprisoned for potentially years at a time on a monthly basis. The draconian laws set up by the government

According to Kristof (2009), the legalization of drugs is another solution to drug trafficking. With drugs more readily available, at lower prices and higher levels of potency many law enforcement personal and politicians favor legalization of drugs. While other experts favor keeping drug production and sell illegal, but decriminalizing possession. Either way if it is legalize it must be regulated. According to Kristof (2009), the United States have inquired three consequences due to the failure of “The War on Drugs”, increased population in jails, empowered criminals and terrorists, and squandered resources that cannot be replaced. With that said, why continue down a road were the drug problem is not getting resolved. Before drugs were prohibited, usage levels were lower among cocaine and heroin users, and states with legalized marijuana have not seen an increase in consumption, according to Kristof

We should decriminalize drugs in the U.S. instead of legalizing them. Decriminalization refers to the lessening of criminal penalties of certain acts. According to De Marneffe, “… the legalization of drugs … [is] the removal of criminal penalties for the manufacture, sale, and possession of large quantities of recretational drugs, such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine” (346).

All the drug related charges are forcing the prison population into overwhelming numbers. Were drug usage decriminalized this could relieve some of the stress on the penal system. Baird states in her piece that the prison population would diminish greatly with legalization and all the money saved can then be used for many more beneficial things “…like treatment for addiction, health, and prevention.” Walter, standing on the

The current policy in use by the United States concerning illegal drugs is both outdated and unfair. This so-called war on drugs is a deeply rooted campaign of prohibition and unfair sentencing that is very controversial and has been debated for many years. The war on drugs is designed so that it will never end. This current drug was has very little impact on the overall supply of prohibited drugs and its impact on demand seems non-existent. United States’ taxpayers are spending billions of dollars on this failure of policy. They are spending billions to incarcerate drug users instead offering drug treatment which could help lower demand. Legalizing illicit would lower abuse and deaths from use and could have a positive economic impact on the United States. Certain industries are making massive sums of money by capitalizing on the drug war.

There are groups of people in the criminal justice system who considers drug addiction a personal issue, not a criminal one. This could not be further from the truth; drug abuse is illegal and should be treated as such. It is a catalyst for many crimes seen today from mugging to murder. If the numbers of those who abuse drugs are reduced, the amount of crimes associated with the addiction are also reduced. Not only will crime levels be reduced, most of those who undergo treatment tend to be better prepared to do more with their lives and not re-offend.

Drugs are a very strong controversy and people have such strong opinions about whether or not they should be legal or not. I don’t have a strong opinion on this topic, I am easily swayed to either side. For the most part though, I think that they should be legalized because people already do them anyways and will continue to do them. If they were legal then the government could regulate their usage and sale then the government was receiving the profits rather that the drug dealers.

Legalizing drugs is directly accrued to having a desired end, that is, putting the criminal justice system out of business and trying to unsuccessfully control the health lives of the addicts. Drug abuse has been an area where the custody is placed on the people with the drugs and the peddlers. The U.S. public health system has been on stake in trying to deal with the fight on drugs to the abusers. The most critical bit about the whole issue is that drug addiction for every user of heroin leads to a lifetime affliction as well as a disease. This is impervious to the threat of punishment of the justice system. In case nothing else changed during the previous reigns of the various

Drug abuse and crime is not a new concept and the statistics around the problem have continued to rise. According to (Office of Justice Programs, 2011), there were an estimated 1,846,400 state and local arrests for drug abuse in the United States. Additionally, 17 percent of state prisoners and 18 percent of federal inmates said they committed their current offense to obtain money for drugs (Office of Justice Programs, 2011). Based on this information, we can conclude that our criminal justice systems are saturated with drug abusers. The United States has the highest imprisonment rate and about 83 percent of arrests are for possession of illegal drugs (Prisons & Drug Offenders, 2011). Based on these figures, I can conclude that we should be more concerned about solving the drug abusers problems and showing them an alternative lifestyle rather than strict penalty of long term incarceration which will inevitably challenge their ability to be fully functioning citizens after release.