May 25, 1989
Thinking About Drug Legalization
by James Ostrowski
James Ostrowski, an associate policy analyst of the Cato Institute, was vice chairman of the New York County Lawyers Association Committee on Law Reform. .
Executive Summary
Prohibition is an awful flop.
We like it.
It can't stop what it's meant to stop.
We like it.
It's left a trail of graft and slime,
It don't prohibit worth a dime,
It's filled our land with vice and crime.
Nevertheless, we're for it.
Franklin P. Adams (1931)
On Thursday, March 17, 1988, at 10:45 p.m., in the Bronx, Vernia Brown was killed by stray bullets fired in a dispute over illegal drugs.[1] The 19-year-old mother of one was not involved in the dispute, yet her death was a direct consequence of the "war on drugs."
By now, there can be little doubt that most, if not all, "drug-related murders" are the result of drug prohibition. The same type of violence came with the Eighteenth Amendment's ban of alcohol in......
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Approximate Word Count: 12577
Approximate Pages: 49 (260 words per double-spaced page) |