Historic NYT Editorial: Feds Should Legalize Marijuana Pronto

The New York Times editorial board demanded
the end of the federal government’s marijuana ban in an editorial
published Saturday. That editorial, titled “Repeal
Prohibition, Again,” notes that most states are rightly moving
away from vigorous prosecution of drug crimes and asks the feds to
follow suit:

The federal government should repeal the ban on marijuana.

We reached that conclusion after a great deal of discussion
among the members of The Times’s Editorial Board, inspired by a
rapidly growing movement among the states to reform marijuana
laws.

There are no perfect answers to people’s legitimate concerns
about marijuana use. But neither are there such answers about
tobacco or alcohol, and we believe that on every level — health
effects, the impact on society and law-and-order issues — the
balance falls squarely on the side of national legalization. That
will put decisions on whether to allow recreational or medicinal
production and use where it belongs — at the state level.

We considered whether it would be best for Washington to hold
back while the states continued experimenting with legalizing
medicinal uses of marijuana, reducing penalties, or even simply
legalizing all use. Nearly three-quarters of the states have done
one of these.

But that would leave their citizens vulnerable to the whims of
whoever happens to be in the White House and chooses to enforce or
not enforce the federal law.

The editorial’s endorsement of legalization is qualified in some
respects, since it does recommend that the sale of marijuana be
limited to people over the age of 21:

There are legitimate concerns about marijuana on the development
of adolescent brains. For that reason, we advocate the prohibition
of sales to people under 21.

Creating systems for regulating manufacture, sale and marketing
will be complex. But those problems are solvable, and would have
long been dealt with had we as a nation not clung to the decision
to make marijuana production and use a federal crime.

Still, it’s a step in the right direction—albeit one that
libertarians have advocated for decades. If anything, it’s another
clear sign that
libertarianism is winning.

Way to get with the times, Times.