Vote "NO" on Issue 2
Making pot legal will not help Ohio.
The age-old question is before Ohioans once again. “Should recreational marijuana be decriminalized?”
Advocates of recreational marijuana legislation suggest that legalization reduces crime, raises tax revenue, lowers criminal justice expenditures, improves public health, increases traffic safety, and stimulates the economy.
Critics argue that the legalization of recreational marijuana spurs other, more dangerous drug use, increases crime, diminishes traffic safety, harms public health, and lowers workforce productivity.
We have seen the consequences of marijuana legalization in other states, including high addiction rates, spikes in traffic accidents, reductions in IQ, increases in drug-related school suspensions, expulsions of students, and law enforcement referrals.
While a state government initially benefits from taxation, as usage of marijuana increases, its direct and indirect negative impact costs quickly surpass that of the income brought into the state. Similar, but to a much lesser degree, was the impact of opium on China during the opium wars.
The problem with the Libertarian viewpoint, which does not stand up under the scrutiny of the real world nor does it stand up to circumspection under Austrian economics, is the fallacy that once legalized, there is no limit to the tax the state of Ohio could charge. As we have seen in other states that try to tax marijuana at a similar rate to that of cigarettes - we see illegal sales of marijuana soar - this pumps money into gangs and organized crime and only exacerbates the war on drugs - it does not help to reduce or eliminate it.
Should the government be able to tell you what you can and cannot put in your body? Indeed, the government has abused the privilege of regulating drugs - but highly addictive drugs, as we have seen throughout history, cause our fellow man to make poor choices and leads to activity that negatively impacts those not doing drugs.
In the early 19th century, more and more Chinese were smoking British opium as a recreational drug. But for many, what started as recreation soon became a punishing addiction: many people who stopped ingesting opium suffered chills, nausea, and cramps and sometimes died from withdrawal. Once addicted, people would often do almost anything to continue accessing the drug. By 1830, the productive output of the Chinese people was reduced by almost 50%, making opium an epidemic of catastrophic proportions. China realized if they could not suppress the trade of opium and addiction to it, the Chinese empire would have no peasants to work the land, no townsfolk to pay taxes, no students to study, and no soldiers to fight. Cannabis is not nearly as destructive nor as addictive as cannabis. Still, because the Mexican and Columbian cartels help move more addictive drugs with illegal marijuana through their gangs and networks, we can expect a predictable and substantial expansion of drugs like meth and other opioids. Along with the predictable uptick in deaths, we should see a rise in violent crimes and a deterioration of urban and suburban schools.
Suppose we want to hand off to the next generation a state better than when we got it. We need to vote NO on recreational marijuana. This is not to say that legalizing recreational use will cause a catastrophe overnight. It won’t. It is, however, a seed that, once planted, will grow over the years, and just as legalized gambling has not lived up to its promises - neither will recreational marijuana legalization.
Legalized gambling was sold as a way to finance our schools, and property tax levies for our schools would be a thing of the past. Rigorous oversight of gambling would help ward off severe addictions. Today, we see no shortage of tax levies to fund our schools, and Ohio has no shortage of gambling addicts.
China won the war on Opium - not by taking a pragmatic approach (that is, an approach not focused on the morality of the issue). China initially focused on targeting opium users rather than opium producers. They argued that the production and sale of opium should be legalized and then taxed by the government. The prevailing belief was that taxing the drug would make it so expensive that people would have to smoke less or not at all. They also argued that the money collected from taxing the opium trade could help the Chinese government reduce revenue shortfalls and the outflow of silver. After a trial run for a decade in a few of its provinces, China saw this was an utter failure.
Led by Lin Zexu, a very capable and ambitious Chinese government official, he argued that the opium trade was a moral issue and an “evil” that had to be eliminated by any means possible. He argued that instead of targeting opium users, they should stop and punish the “pushers” who imported and sold the drug in China. After six weeks, of executing dealers and seizing foreign shipments, China had eliminated over 2.6 million pounds of opium (over 20,000 chests) over half the annual trade pumped into the country.
We must keep in mind so we are not condemned to repeat history:
History is replete with examples of dealing with addictive substances on large scales.
Medical marijuana is already legal and easily accessible for a multitude of legitimate conditions.
The negative impact will happen slowly over time.
The government will not profit from legalizing marijuana due to direct and indirect illegal activity.
The inner-cities and minorities will be disproportionately and negatively impacted.
Drug cartels and gang activity will be exacerbated.
Ohio’s productive output will be significantly reduced.
Violent crime will rise.
Human trafficking will increase.
Childhood addiction and deaths will rise dramatically.
Solutions
The Ohio legislators should consider:
Make it illegal to sell marijuana but make it legal to possess a personal amount of marijuana.
Provide progressive tax and fines for amounts larger than a personal amount.
Place a tax on the illegal sale of marijuana to make it easier to penalize dealers through forfeiture.
If a user has higher than a personal amount of marijuana - if they cooperate with law enforcement in handing over their supplier, they will receive automatic expungement after one year for their first and second offenses.
Allow those who have broken the law with less than a commercial amount of marijuana but more than a personal amount to do community service rather than serve jail time.
Place the death penalty for distributors of any heroin or fentanyl-laced marijuana.
Require a license to grow a personal amount of marijuana and a license for a community garden.