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Prominent People
Most people reject outright the Legalization of Drugs, however, some prominent people support Legalizing Illicit Drugs:
George Shultz, former President Reagan's Secretary of State, says that "Legalization would destroy dealer profits and remove their incentive to get young people addicted." New Mexico governor Gary Johnson stirred controversy by proposing the full-scale legalization of drugs on October 1999. It might surprise you to know that a very large proportion of economists share that... Addicted to Drugs (Legalization, That Is) Abraham Lincoln: "Prohibition will work great injury to the cause of temperance... for it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crime. A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded". President Fox, of Mexico, supports the Legalization of Drugs to win the War on Drugs, on March 2001. U.S. Federal District Judge Robert Sweet says the nation should learn the lesson of prohibition and the crime that ensued when alcohol was illegal. "Look at tobacco, the most addictive drug, and we've reduced use by a third." Former Surgeon General Elders told a National Press Club luncheon,"Sixty percent of violent crimes are drug- or alcohol-related.... Many times they're robbing, stealing and all of these things to get money to buy drugs.... I do feel that we would markedly reduce our crime rate if drugs were legalized." Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke commented on former Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders' call for a study to legalize drugs. "I think what the Surgeon General said was absolutely courageous and correct."... he believes drugs can be a revenue source for the government. "Remove the profit motive, and you put the dealers out of business... have government stores and buy marijuana cigarettes... nicely wrapped, purity and potency guaranteed with a tax stamp." Nobel laureate in economics Milton Friedman says that the criminalization of certain drugs undermines respect for the law and creates "a decadent moral climate." He states that legalizing drugs like marijuana and cocaine would "thus strike a double blow; reduce crime activity directly, and at the same time increase the efficacy of law enforcement and crime prevention." Aryeh Neier, president of billionaire philanthropist George Soros's Open Society Institute, states, "The current drug policy is wasteful and it promotes crime and disease.... From every standpoint, it is a failure." Syndicated columnist Abigail Van Buren endorses Legalization. She wrote in her column, "Dear Abby," that, "The legalization of drugs would put drug dealers out of business."She added that it would also reduce the prison population and create a perpetual source of tax revenue. Professor Steven Duke told an America Online computer network audience, "Without a doubt, the problem of violent crime would be ameliorated by legalizing drugs. I think drug prohibition causes half of our serious crime." Rep. Barney Frank (D-Ma.) supports legalization. "We make a mistake, with the serious law enforcement problems we have today, to get the police to arrest people who smoke marijuana.... We are wasting $10 billion a year trying to physically interdict drugs." George Bushnell, the new president of the American Bar Association, favors legalizing marijuana and cocaine. He believes legalization will cut crime. Ethan Nadelmann, a former Princeton University professor and now director of the Lindesmith Center, states: "Make sure that junkies have access to clean needles; make it easy for addicts to obtain methadone; give heroin-maintenance programs a chance to work; decriminalize marijuana; stop spending billions on incarcerating drug users and drug dealers. We know we can reduce drug abuse more effectively by spending that money on education, pre and post natal care and job-training programs." ... Nadelmann told the Rolling Stone audience, "...The Pentagon's interdiction efforts, which cost U.S. taxpayers close to $1 billion... had no impact on the flow of drugs.... The drug war has been most efficient at filling up the country's prisons and jails." In January 1994 the Clinton Administration decided to review the federal ban against the use of marijuana for medical purposes. Allen St. Pierre, deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), commented on the review decision: "It's encouraging to see that the public health service is going to get information about the efficacy of marijuana as a therapeutic agent.... If marijuana can never be made available to people suffering pain or going blind, it's never going to be legalized more generally."
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