Argument Essay - Illegalize Alcohol

Jordan Degenhart
Argument Essay Draft

Our country is facing a growing problem. It is a problem of moral decay. The legal and open use of alcohol is an unnecessary vice that is enjoyed and accepted by a majority of the United States population, unfortunately, it leads to social and moral downfalls. Alcohol should be held to the same standards as other illegal mind and body-altering substances, as alcohol is addicting and has no medical value. Lawmakers and active voters should put an outright ban on alcohol. The revenue that is generated from the manufacturing, distributing, and sales of alcohol is a major source of taxable income that is a benefit. As of 2007 the U.S. Government was collecting $5.6 billion dollars annually from the taxation of alcohol (joshritchie). This revenue has tended to increase each and every year. Although the revenue is important, the question must be asked, is it moral? Is it moral for our government to profit off the sale of a frivolous vice that causes fatalities and creates addicts? The revenue that is made from the taxation of alcohol could be lost, and would simply increase our never-ending national debt by a miniscule amount. Through out history our country has faced several social epidemics that have resulted in many people becoming substance abusers. Though these times our government has stepped in and enforced laws to restore the moral and social fabric of the infected areas. The current epidemic that we are facing is the abuse of alcohol. It is widespread and available almost everywhere in our country. “According to the Alcohol-Related Disease Impact (ARDI) tool, from 2001–2005, there were approximately 79,000 deaths annually attributable to excessive alcohol use.” (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) Beyond the number of the deaths that are related to alcohol every year, a staggering number of people in the United States are alcoholics. According to the National Library of Medicine, “nearly 17.6 million adults in the United States are alcoholics or have alcohol problems”. (U.S. National Library of Medicine) We need to completely ban alcohol so that we can start working on decreasing the number of addicts in our country rather than encourage the use to every single person just as he or she turns a certain age. The United States government has already tried to ban alcohol in the past, it was a complete failure and subsequently repealed. This attempt resulted in a spike in organized crime and was an obvious failure. Eventually the government conceded and re-legalized the use of alcohol. I too will concede that it was a failure on the part of our government in enforcing the prohibition of alcohol.
Even today we are fighting the exact same battle by the DEA with the Controlled Substances Act. There is already a long list of illegal substances that are given priorities and schedules and are subsequently enforced. It would not be a stretch to incorporate alcohol into this list of illegal drugs. Many would assert that it would be difficult to enforce the mere consumption and manufacturing of small amounts of alcohol by individuals in there own homes. It is a very simple process to either brew low alcohol content drinks or to distill higher alcohol content spirits.
The enforcing of these laws would be similar to current laws of cannabis cultivation. These laws would seem just as hard to enforce, yet they are enforced. The manufacturing of homemade alcohol could be given the same fear of punishment and could be enforced on incident-to-incident bases. Alcohol has the tendency to increase the probability of someone committing a violent crime. If alcohol were banned and harder to get a hold of this number of crimes would greatly diminish. The National Center for Victims of Crime has referenced the U.S. Department of Justice concerning drug and alcohol related crimes. The report states, “The U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics ' National Crime Victimization Survey asks the violent crime victims who reported seeing their offenders whether they perceived the offender to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol. According to the 1999 survey, over a quarter of the violent crime victims could make such a determination. About twenty-eight percent (28%) of those reported that the offender was under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs. The most common substance identified was alcohol alone. About sixteen percent (16%) reported that the offender was under the influence of alcohol alone (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2001).” (The National Center for Victims of Crime) This only takes into account the victims that were able to see their offender; this means that there are possibly more unaccounted for alcohol related crimes. The legal and open use of alcohol as a vice is leading to the downfall of our society. It is creating addicts while not offering a single practical medical benefit. The United States Government has already invested time, money, and effort to enforcing its Controlled Substances Act. Alcohol should be held to the same standards as all other physically altering substances are held to. Alcohol poses the risk of dependence and has no beneficial medical value. In order to start the moral fabric of our country we need to do away with the crime inducing substance alcohol. Lawmakers and active voters, it is our duty to hold our selves to higher standards and completely abolish the manufacturing, sale, and use of alcohol.
Works Cited
"Alcoholism: MedlinePlus." National Library of Medicine - National Institutes of Health. 25 Aug. 2011. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. <http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/alcoholism.html>.

"CDC - Alcohol and Public Health Home Page - Alcohol." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 16 Nov. 2011. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. <http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/>.

"Drug Related Crime." The National Center for Victims of Crime. 2008. Web. 1 Dec. 2011. <http://www.ncvc.org/ncvc/main.aspx?dbName=DocumentViewer&DocumentID=32348>.

Joshritchie. "How Much Is the Government Making Off of Alcohol? | Tax Break: The TurboTax Blog." Tax Break: The TurboTax Blog | It 's All about the Refund. 5 July 2010. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. <http://blog.turbotax.intuit.com/2010/07/05/how-much-is-the-government-making-off-of-alcohol/>.

Cited: "Alcoholism: MedlinePlus." National Library of Medicine - National Institutes of Health. 25 Aug. 2011. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. &lt;http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/alcoholism.html&gt;. "CDC - Alcohol and Public Health Home Page - Alcohol." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 16 Nov. 2011. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. &lt;http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/&gt;. "Drug Related Crime." The National Center for Victims of Crime. 2008. Web. 1 Dec. 2011. &lt;http://www.ncvc.org/ncvc/main.aspx?dbName=DocumentViewer&amp;DocumentID=32348&gt;. Joshritchie. "How Much Is the Government Making Off of Alcohol? | Tax Break: The TurboTax Blog." Tax Break: The TurboTax Blog | It 's All about the Refund. 5 July 2010. Web. 01 Dec. 2011. &lt;http://blog.turbotax.intuit.com/2010/07/05/how-much-is-the-government-making-off-of-alcohol/&gt;.