Should Marijuana Be Legalized - 2786 Words

Growing up every child was told that they had inherent rights, but they didn’t comprehend the concept completely until they grew up and were face to face with it. The Declaration of Independence clearly states that every person is endowed with unalienable rights which include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If every person is allowed these rights then it is in anyone’s right to do what they please in order to achieve happiness. Many people believe that the government is standing in the way of their pursuit of happiness. Every person has something different that gives them happiness which is partially why the government and society don’t see eye to eye. The current laws against drugs and controlled substances such as marijuana†¦show more content†¦President Reagan then set up efforts with the Drug Enforcement Agency, military, and city/state law enforcement to prosecute drug traffickers and intercept supplies (Bartilow 1). The war against marijuana and drugs in general has caused some very upsetting collateral damage in recent decades. Innocent civilians are being murdered because authorities are mistaking them for criminals. For example Anne Rae Dixon an 84 year-old, paraplegic, bed ridden, woman from Texas was shot in the chest and died during a drug raid where authorities were looking for her granddaughter. Authorities were not only out of their jurisdiction but also no drugs or weapons turned up in the raid. The jury surprisingly decided the officer who shot Mrs. Dixon would not be charged with negligence. In the following years many more innocent lives were lost thanks to some incompetently organized drug raids in the next set of years (Balko 1). In Horace Bartilow’s essay on the collateral damage caused by the war against drugs he states how U.S. involvement in drug enforcement escalates the drug related violence. Drugs have been proven to be dangerous but not the deadliest, unlike th e drug war itself. The war is causing people to die because of prohibition, not the war itself. This was has torn apart families, imprisoned many innocent people, and led to the misuse of a lot of U.S. money. Decriminalizing cannabis could benefit America greatly and could take a big