PHILOSOPHIC ARGUMENTS
Personal freedom: What persons do in their residences, according to some, should not be regulated by the government. Many argue that persons should be able to do whatever they want with their bodies, as long as they do not harm others. The argument is that drug use is a
victimless crime and as such the government has no right to prohibit it or punish drug consumers, much like the government does not forbid overeating, which causes significantly more deaths per year. This can be equated with the quest for
freedom of thought.
Consistency: It has been shown that ending prohibition reduces the use of hard drugs as it has in countries such as the Netherlands. Since alcohol
prohibition ended and the
War on Drugs began, there has been much debate over the issue of consistency among legislators with regard to drug prohibition. Many anti-prohibition activists like to bring up the dangers of alcohol which can be severe when compared to drugs. In addition to
anecdotal evidence, they cite statistics to show more deaths caused by drunk driving than by drivers under the influence of marijuana, more assaults instigated by drunks than by smokers, and more property damage.
CRIME
Critics of drug prohibition often cite the fact that the end of alcohol prohibition in 1933 led to immediate decreases in murders and robberies to support the argument that legalization of drugs could have similar effects. Once those involved in the narcotics trade have a legal method of settling business disputes, the number of murders and violent crime could drop. Robert W. Sweet, a federal judge, strongly agrees: "The present policy of trying to prohibit the use of drugs through the use of criminal law is a mistake". When alcohol use was outlawed during prohibition, it gave rise to gang warfare and spurred the formation of some of the most well known criminals of the era, among them the infamous
Al Capone. Similarly, drug dealers today resolve their disputes through violence and intimidation, something which legal drug vendors do not do.
Drug money is also known as a major source of income for terrorist organizations, as President
George W. Bush has mentioned. Critics assert that legalization would remove this central source of support for terror.
PROVEN INEFFECTIVENESS
The "
war on drugs" started in a $350 million budget in 1971 and is currently (in 2006) a $20,000 million campaign. After more than 30 years in practice the war on drugs is having little or no effect on the trafficking of drugs, except to make them more expensive. Since the use of all major recreational drugs except opiates has increased since the passing of the laws which illegalized them, the increase in cost cannot be said to discourage the use of the drugs.
ROMANTICIZING THE FORBIDDEN FRUITThe war on drugs is counterproductive to the goal of discouraging drug use. The primary mechanism for this is reverse psychology. Forbidden things become fodder for rebellion, and illegal drugs have been popularized by this perception. In addition there is a great disparity of The United States' ability to enforce drug laws among those above and below the age of 18, and this causes highschool aged children to become the conduit through which drugs are distributed, contravening our "protect the children" intentions. This argument is often summed up as "
Adam and Eve didn't eat the
forbidden fruit because they were hungry, but because it was forbidden."
CRIMINALIZATION INCREASES PROFITS FOR DRUG DEALERSLegalization would reduce the profits of drug dealing. The illegal drug business is very profitable since the price of a product increases when it is made illegal. "Whenever there is a great demand for a product and (the) government makes it illegal, a
black market always appears to supply the demand".
Yearly drug trafficking earnings average to about 60 billion dollars and range as high as 100 billion dollars a year. Marijuana is the largest cash crop in ten states and the second largest cash crop in the U.S., after corn.
"Revenues from drug trafficking in Miami, FL., are greater than those from tourism, exports, health care, and all other legitimate businesses combined". The U.S. illegal drug market is one-eighth of the total world market, making it the largest illegal drug market in the world.
Janet Crist of the White House Office of
National Drug Policy mentioned that the anti-drug efforts have had "no direct effect on either the price or the availability of cocaine on our streets". Additionally, drug dealers show off expensive jewelry and clothing to young kids. Some of these kids are interested in making fast money instead of working legitimate jobs. Drug legalization would remove the "glamorous Al Capone-type traffickers who are role-models for the young".
DIVERTED RESOURCES INCREASE NON DRUG RELATED CRIMESThe war on drugs is extremely costly to such societies that outlaw drugs in terms of taxpayer money, lives, productivity, the inability of law enforcement to pursue
mala in se crimes, and social inequality.
Some proponents of legalization say that The financial and social costs of drug law enforcement far exceed the damages that the drugs themselves cause.
DRUG ADDICTION AS A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUEIf drugs were legalized, drug addiction and abuse would become a health issue, and public health would be enhanced. For one, cleaner drugs would lead to improved health. By selling drugs in state clinics or stores, the government would be able to maintain quality control over drug sales.
As with
alcohol, the
Food and Drug Administration (in US) would guarantee purity and safety.
Steven B. Duke and
Albert C. Gross conclude that drug legalization would result in a reduced risk of drug poisoning or overdose. Producers and traffickers currently sell poisonously diluted drugs because they are cheaper and easier to import. Legalization would allow a control of the diluted form and extent.
"If drug purities were standardized and clearly and accurately labeled, the likelihood of a person accidentally overdosing would be much less than it is under the present regime". Administration of clean needles would lessen disease transmitted by drug abusers, including
AIDS. Pregnant women with drug problems would receive better prenatal care. Furthermore, the introduction of addictive agents added into the drug can also be regulated.
Currently, it is difficult for drug users to ask for help or seek treatment because of the criminal status of drugs; drug abuse should be considered an illness. Peter J. Riga believes "it is shameful and irrational that users of
cocaine and
heroin are labeled criminals and go to jail—with almost no hope of therapy or
rehabilitation—while the users of the powerful drug alcohol are considered sick and given therapy."
The government provides very little funding for drug treatment, resulting in the abuse of addicted people. New York City imprisons one drug abuser for more than 150 dollars per day, but ignores the need of the user. Convicted addicts without money have to wait at least four months for therapy. Treatment is "available for only about 15 [percent] of the nation's drug addicts." Recurrently, judges have to follow mandatory sentencing guidelines when prosecuting drug users. The New York Times mentions that in New York in April 1993, two federal judges were fed up with the guidelines and refused to hear any case that was drug-related.
Drugs cannot be used for medical purposes because of prohibition.
Cannabis is a
Schedule I drug, which means that it has no accepted medical uses. The benefits of its use include easing the pain of terminally ill patients. For chemotherapy and AIDS patients, cannabis increases their appetite and counters nausea. The
American Medical Association protested the 1937
Marijuana Tax Act due to its interest in cannabis for medical purposes.
The
Netherlands government treats drug use as a health problem, not a criminal problem (although there is criminal punishment for trafficking in some "harder drugs"). Because of the country's decision, treatment for drug addiction is widely available in the
Netherlands. In Amsterdam 75 percent of heroin addicts are on treatment. "
HIV infection rate among injective drug users in cities like Amsterdam has dropped from 11 percent to 4 percent and is now one of the lowest in the world".
A key component of this argument is that many of the health dangers associated with recreational drugs exist precisely because they are illegal. The government cannot enforce quality control on products sold and manufactured illegaly. Examples would include: heroin/cocaine overdoses occurring as users don't know exactly how much they are taking, heroin users injecting brick dust with which their heroin had been cut, the more toxic (and easier to make) derivative MDA sold as MDMA etc.
USER COST OF DRUGSWhen the cost of drugs increases, drugs users are more likely to commit crimes in order to obtain money to buy the expensive drugs. Legalizing drugs would make drugs reasonably cheap. Poor addicts or recreational users would be capable of honest work and would not be driven to commit criminal acts to support their habits.
RACISM AND UNEQUAL ENFORCEMENT OF DRUG LAWSSome consider the war on drugs, at least in the United States, to be a "war on some drugs"...and some drug users. Current drug laws are enforced in such a way as to penalize African-Americans more harshly and more often than other ethnic groups, and to penalize the poor of all races more harshly and more often than the middle and upper classes.
The belief that "hard" drugs such as crack cocaine warrant stronger sentences than "soft" drugs such as marijuana or even powder cocaine represents a double standard not supported by scientific evidence. Defendants convicted of selling crack cocaine receive equal sentences to those convicted of selling 100 times the same amount of powder cocaine. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the majority of offenders convicted for selling crack are poor and/or black, while the majority of those convicted for selling cocaine are not. In fact, Blacks only constitute 13% of all known drug users, but represent 35% of all arrests for drug possession and 74% of all those sentenced to prison for drug possession. In addition, the convention of selling crack in heavily patrolled neighborhoods makes crack dealers easier targets for arrest than cocaine dealers, who tend to operate in private areas, such as dance clubs and college campuses. If this does not demonstrate that antidrug laws are useless in themselves (so the argument goes), it shows that they are clearly being implemented inequitably.
THE CREATION OF DRUG CARTELSMassive arrests of local growers of marijuana, for example, not only increases the price of local drugs, but protects the major drug cartels from any competition. Only major retailers that can handle massive shipments, have their own small fleet of aircraft, troops to defend the caravans and other sophisticated methods of eluding the police (such as lawyers), can survive by this regulation of the free market by the government.
Milton Friedman :"...it is because it's prohibited. See, if you look at the drug war from a purely economic point of view, the role of the government is to protect the drug cartel. That's literally true."
EFFECT ON PRODUCER COUNTRIES The United States' "
War on Drugs" has added considerably to the political instability in
South America. The huge profits to be made from cocaine and other South American-grown drugs are largely due to the fact that it is illegal in the wealthy neighbouring nation. This drives people in the relatively poor countries of
Colombia,
Peru and
Brazil to break their own laws in organising the cultivation, preparation and trafficking of cocaine to the States. This has allowed criminal,
paramilitary and
guerrilla groups to reap huge profits, exacerbating already serious law-and-order and political problems.
Coca farming has been practiced for centuries in Andes countries, producing coca leaves which are then chewed for their mild stimulant effect. Many of these farmers' livelihoods (whether or not they are supplying the cocaine trade) are destroyed by U.S. sponsored herbicide spraying, usually by air.
Furthermore, the sale of the illegal drugs produces an influx of dollars that is outside the formal economy, and puts pressure on the currency exchange keeping the dollar low and making the export of legal products more difficult.
Fonte:
wikipedia.org 
