Should Marijuana Be Legalized - 1594 Words

In today’s society we are currently debating whether marijuana should become legalized. There are currently 19 states who allow marijuana for medicinal use and 4 states who allow marijuana for recreational use. Abraham Lincoln once said â€Å"Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man’s appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are crimes.† The United States spends billions of dollars a year on the â€Å"War against drugs,† it’s time we stop wasting tax payer’s money. How about instead of spending billions, the nation earns billions. If marijuana was legalized it would generate an enormous tax revenue, reduce crime, and give cancer and Aids patients another natural form of medicine. The†¦show more content†¦Those who still wanted to consume alcohol found ways to do so. â€Å"The Prohibition era encouraged the rise of criminal activity associated with bootlegging† (AE S taff 2009). Al Capone earned $60 million annually from his bootlegging operations (AE Staff 2009). Prohibition increases violence and criminal activity. If you think about it alcohol prohibition caused gangsters to fight dirty just to make a dollar. So many people wanted alcohol that it took the â€Å"bad guys† to get the people what they wanted. Al Capone took advantage of supply and demand. He saw that people demanded alcohol so he illegally supplied it making him millions. The same thing is happening with marijuana, people are demanding it and the â€Å"bad guy† is suppling it. We could take down a lot of criminal activity by taking away the millions-billions that drug lords are making. Let’s take these millions-billions and pump it back into the economy, create more jobs and better our education system. When one compares marijuana to alcohol, one quickly realize the number of lives lost from alcohol related deaths. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimat ed 3.3 million deaths were caused by alcohol consumption. Marijuana is 114 times less deadly than alcohol. According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), alcohol is the most commonly addictive substance in the United States. The NIAAA states that there are