I firmly believe that marijuana should be legalized in America for both medical and recreation use. There are many reasons to support this opinion. Marijuana prohibition is a costly failure, studies have shown no negative health effects from the smoking of marijuana and can actually be used to help patients medically for many diseases, legalization of marijuana could also lead to lower crime rates. In 1937 when marijuana was first federally prohibited only few Americans even knew what this plant was. Prohibition is based on lies and disinformation, effecting the credibility of teachers, law enforcement officials, and scientists throughout the country. The dangers of marijuana use have been exaggerated for almost a century and the recent scientific research does not support the reefer madness predictions of the past or present. Today, Between 95 and 100 million American admitted to trying it. A study done in 2007 showed that marijuana is now Americas largest cash crop, beating out corn and wheat combined. According to government funded researchers high schoolers reported that marijuana is “easily available” even with the costly nationwide drug prohibition. There have been over 9 million arrests since 1995 for this so called “terrible plant” 0ver 800,000 of them being in 2007, coming out to more than all violent crimes combined! According to {http://www.mpp.org/} a person is arrested for marijuana every 36 seconds and about 89% of those arrests are for possession, not manufacture or distribution. Federal figures indicate that more than 41,000 Americans are in a state or federal prison jus for marijuana charges not combining county jails. America is wasting their money on harmless potheads when they should be focusing on the bigger problems like poverty, murder, heroin, and meth. Marijuana Is one of the most useful medical discoveries. It has been used to help diseases such as multiple sclerosis, AIDS, Glaucoma, bulimia and much
I firmly believe that marijuana should be legalized in America for both medical and recreation use. There are many reasons to support this opinion. Marijuana prohibition is a costly failure, studies have shown no negative health effects from the smoking of marijuana and can actually be used to help patients medically for many diseases, legalization of marijuana could also lead to lower crime rates. In 1937 when marijuana was first federally prohibited only few Americans even knew what this plant was. Prohibition is based on lies and disinformation, effecting the credibility of teachers, law enforcement officials, and scientists throughout the country. The dangers of marijuana use have been exaggerated for almost a century and the recent scientific research does not support the reefer madness predictions of the past or present. Today, Between 95 and 100 million American admitted to trying it. A study done in 2007 showed that marijuana is now Americas largest cash crop, beating out corn and wheat combined. According to government funded researchers high schoolers reported that marijuana is “easily available” even with the costly nationwide drug prohibition. There have been over 9 million arrests since 1995 for this so called “terrible plant” 0ver 800,000 of them being in 2007, coming out to more than all violent crimes combined! According to {http://www.mpp.org/} a person is arrested for marijuana every 36 seconds and about 89% of those arrests are for possession, not manufacture or distribution. Federal figures indicate that more than 41,000 Americans are in a state or federal prison jus for marijuana charges not combining county jails. America is wasting their money on harmless potheads when they should be focusing on the bigger problems like poverty, murder, heroin, and meth. Marijuana Is one of the most useful medical discoveries. It has been used to help diseases such as multiple sclerosis, AIDS, Glaucoma, bulimia and much