Drug Legalization

Arguments for legalizing drugs

Why drug laws should be repealed

Benefits Benefits of liberty

Benefits from drug use (pleasure, medicinal uses, social interaction)

Experiments in living benefit others who learn from it

Limiting choices harms everyone by limiting information

Liberty

Drug users are agents Free Voluntary Informed

They don’t threaten rights of others Mill’s bridge: can only warn of danger

Critique of Government Action You care most about your own good;

you have stronger incentive to protect yourself than anyone else has to protect you

You know most about your own good; your choices are more likely to lead to happiness than those anyone else might select

Costs Costs

Courts (case loads, costs, delays) Police ($20 billion/year) Prisons ($10 billion/year— 1/2 prison

population there for drug-related offenses) Lost tax revenue: $10 billion/year

Increased Harms

Enforcement is ineffective Increased harms from drugs

Switches to stronger, more easily concealed drugs with higher profit margins

No controls on quality, strength, contamination

No information about reasonable use

Other Harms Other harms

Corruption Violence Loss of respect for law (inconsistency)

Injustice “tyranny of the majority” racial profiling imprisoned African-Americans

Rates of imprisonment (100,000)

United States: 546 Georgia: 730 Texas: 700 Florida: 636 California: 607

Italy: 89 UK: 86 France: 84 Germany: 80 Holland: 51

Arguments for Drug Laws

Why we shouldn’t legalize drugs

Harms to Users

Drug laws succeed in discouraging use Legalization would increase harms to

users More use, including underage use More addiction More illnesses, overdoses, deaths Less recovery; treatment succeeds only

when compulsory

Harms to Others Associates of users: family, friends, co-

workers, customers, unborn Victims of users: victims of accidents,

violence, crime Everyone else: increased health care,

insurance costs, lost productivity

Voluntariness

Voluntariness (competence): Is an addict really exercising liberty? Voluntary slavery: Are we really “free not

to be free”? Analogy:

“give me your wallet or I’ll beat you up”— this is coercion, not freedom

But withdrawal may be worse than a beating

Knowledge Ignorance: Do drug users really have

enough information to make reasonable choices? Analogy: prescription drugs Drug education? Cognitive blindspot: Long-term

consequences

Communitarian Arguments

Offense to others Moral harm

Agent: “debases the soul” Others: bad example

Social cohesion (expectations)

Liberal Arguments

Exploitation: drug suppliers would be using users, profiting from their weakness Cf. Big tobacco, big alcohol, etc.

Support: insurance against weakness of will Lower v. higher-order desires: we may

want something we want not to want

Liberal Arguments

Risk Some drugs may be so harmful that

it could never be reasonable to use them

Irrationality: we assume coercion, incompetence, or ignorance (Mill’s bridge)

Conservative Arguments

Character Drug use impedes character

development Society is not just for adults Laws must help mold children into

responsible adults

Conservative Arguments

Tradeoffs Other values are at stake: community,

virtue, productivity, prosperity, safety, etc.

Increasing liberty to use drugs could place these in jeopardy

Conservative Arguments Tradition

Long tradition of drug laws Society is complicated; we must find

best laws by experimenting over long time

Product of reasoned choices Good guide to human nature Can’t predict effects of legalization