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r ~ . ThC BCnC~lls of porary America." it sand- "marijuana does not. m our con- Decriminalization sideredjudgment,rankveryhigh." President Nixon felt betrayed by the commission and re- ARRY J. Anslinger headed the Federal Bureau of jetted its findings. A decade later the National Academy of ~ Narcotics during the I930s and supervised the cam- Sciences studied the health effects of marijuana and con- paign to make marijuana illegal under state and fed- cluded that it should be decriminalized, a finding that Presi- eral laws. In ' :Marijuana: Assassin of Youth" and similar az- dent Reagan rejected. Nevertheless, ten states have largely titles Anslinger led readers to believe that the drug rendered decriminalized marijuana possession, thereby saving billions its users homicidal, suicidal, and insane. Amid the anxieties of dollars in court and prison costs-without experiencing of the Great Depression, marijuana use was linked to poor an increase in marijuana use. Ohio currently has the most Mexicans and blacks, "inferior" races whose alleged sexual liberal marijuana laws in the nation: possession of up to promiscuity and violence stemmed partly from smoking pot. three ounces is a misdemeanor punishable by a 100 fine. In "The dominant race and most enlightened countries aze alto- July of last year, with little fanfare, Ohio decriminalized the holic," one opponent of marijuana use claimed, expressing a cultivation of small amounts of marijuana for personal use. ~i widely held belief, "whilst the races and nations addicted to The change in the laws was backed by the state's conserva- ~ hemp ...have deteriorated both mentally and physically." live Republican governor, George V. Voinovich. Marijuana was the "killer weed," a foreign influence on There seems to be little correlation between the severiro American life that was capable of transforming healthy teen- of a nation's marijuana laws and the rate of use among its agers into sex-crazed maniacs. Anslinger later admitted to teenagers. In the United Kingdom, where drug penalties are the historian David F. Musto that the FBN had somewhat ex- harshly enforced, the rate of marijuana use among fifteen- aggerated the dangers of marijuana. Anslinger had hoped to and sixteen-year-olds is the highest in Western Europe~ne make marijuana seem so awful and so terrifying that young and a half times the rate in Spain and the Netherlands, where people would be afraid to try it even once. the drug has been decriminalized. The UK rate is six times 1 Marijuana's "un-American" reputation has made it im- as high as the rate in Sweden, a nation that has single-mind- mensely appealing to rebellious, disaffected youth. Lurid pro- wily pursued apublic-health approach to drug control. Swe- ~ 1 paganda films like Reefer Madness, Devil's Harvest, and den now has the lowest rate of marijuana use in Westem Eu- Marijunnn: Weed With Roots in Hell, which promised a rope. Under Swedish law the maximum punishment for most glimpse of not only the horrors but also the "weird orgies" marijuana traffickers is a prison term of three years. caused by the drug, no doubt encouraged more than one brave Cultural factors exert far more influence on a country's soul to take a puff. The huge difference between the alleged rate of marijuana use than any changes in the law. The Neth- and the actual effects of marijuana has long provided young erlands decriminalized marijuana in 1976-and yet teenage people with grounds for distrusting authority. Praised by use there declined by as much as 40 percent over the next rebels and artists as diverse as Cab Calloway, Jack Kerouac, decade. The rate of use among American teenagers peaked Arlo Guthrie, and Snoop Doggie Dog, marijuana has attained in 1979 and had already fallen by 40 percent when Congress a lofty symbolic impottance. A distinct culture has evolved passed the An[i-Drug Abuse Act, in 1986. As young Ameri- around marijuana, one championed by proud outcasts. The cans became more health conscious, their use of alcohol and laws aimed at that culture have only perpetuated it, enshrining tobacco also declined. Since 1979 the rate of alcohol use the cannabis leaf as a symbol of adolescent protest. among American teenagers has fallen by 52 percent-with- In 1970 President Richard Nixon appointed acommis- out any life sentences for selling beer. lion to study the health effects, legal status, and social im- The conclusions of the National Commission on Marijuana pact of marijuana use. After more than a year of research the and Drug Abuse are as valid today as they were twenty-five National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse con- years ago: the United States should decriminalize marijuana cluded that marijuana should be decriminalized under state for persotal use; possessing small amounts of it should no and federal laws. The commission unanimously agreed that longer be a crime; growing or selling it commercially, using it the possession of small amounts of marijuana in the home in public, distributing it to young people, and driving under its should no longer be a crime. "Recognizing the extensive de- influence should remain sMctly forbidden. The decriminaliza- gree of misinformation about marijuana as ? drug, we have lion of mazijuana-including, as in the Ohio model, the culti- tried to demrr/m/ngize it."' the commission explained. vation of small amounts~ould be the firs[ step toward a ra- "Viewing the use of marijuana in its wider social context, tional and sensible drug-control policy. The benefits would be we have tried [o des_eniboliee it." The commission argued felt immediately. Law-enforcement resources would be di- that society should strongly discourage marijuana use while vented from the apprehension and imprisonment of marijuana devoting more resources to preventing and treating heavy offenders to the prevention of much more serious crimes. The use. "Considering the range of social concerns in contem- roughly $2.4 billion the United States spends annually just to 11111 \1'1111 I'rOl