The purpose of drug laws through legislation or religious law is to prohibit the recreational use of illegal drugs. Drug laws go all the way back to the 7th century, where alcohol was prohibited under Islamic Sharia law, this law was connected to passages in the Qur'an. Even though some drugs are illegal to possess, most governments regulate the manufacturing, distribution, sale, and marketing of some drugs. For example, through the prescription drugs system, only some drugs are prohibited with a "blanket prohibition" against all possession or use. The type of drugs that are widely banned are narcotics such as opium, stimulants such as cocaine or methamphetamine, hallucinogens such as LSD, sedatives such as GHB, and depressants such as marijuana.
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That is way too much money being spent, and it could go towards other important things like education or healthcare, but instead it is being used to incarcerate offenders. These drug laws have caused the jail and prison populations in North America to increase rapidly, eventually the American government created drug courts to deal with the growing number of people being arrested due to the drug laws. In the United States drug laws are directed at the minority which are Blacks and Hispanics. A study conducted by the Human Rights Watch in 2000 noted that blacks comprise 62.7% and whites 36.7% of all drug offenders sent to state prisons. Most of it was due to the fact that the possession of 5 grams of crack-cocaine comes with a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years, while it takes more than a pound of pure cocaine to get a five year sentence. Crack-cocaine and pure cocaine are chemically the same, but crack is the cheaper version of the two but it has flooded the poor inner-city areas where the minorities live. While cocaine is a very expensive drug and it is normally used by wealthy white people. This is an obvious attack on the minority as they cannot afford good lawyers most of the time so they end up going to jail, while the wealthy white people can afford a lawyer and they do …show more content…
According to CBC in 2014 about 7 million Canadians smoked weed, In the United States 25 million people have smoked weed in the past year, weed is also the most used illegal drug in North America. This shows that the war on drugs is not working because there are millions of people that are still using drugs regardless of consequences. Also a study conducted by UNICEF in 2006 noted that 4,700 Canadians between the ages of 12-17 were charged with a marijuana related offence. Now the Canadian government led by Justin Trudeau is considering legalizing the recreational use of marijuana. They are trying to adopt a system similar to ones in Colorado, Washington, and Oregon. Trudeau's plan is to legalize, regulate, and restrict the access to marijuana. If this happens the government will make a lot of profit from marijuana sales. Overall it would be a better idea to legalize marijuana as the government would no longer have to spend so much money on law enforcement and the correctional system, and that money can be used for education, healthcare also there would be no people getting charged with small offenses like possession of marijuana and getting a criminal record for such a small offense. Currently there are a lot of people across the country that are begging for the federal government to pardon them from their light charges like possession of marijuana, charges like these would affect a person's
That is way too much money being spent, and it could go towards other important things like education or healthcare, but instead it is being used to incarcerate offenders. These drug laws have caused the jail and prison populations in North America to increase rapidly, eventually the American government created drug courts to deal with the growing number of people being arrested due to the drug laws. In the United States drug laws are directed at the minority which are Blacks and Hispanics. A study conducted by the Human Rights Watch in 2000 noted that blacks comprise 62.7% and whites 36.7% of all drug offenders sent to state prisons. Most of it was due to the fact that the possession of 5 grams of crack-cocaine comes with a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years, while it takes more than a pound of pure cocaine to get a five year sentence. Crack-cocaine and pure cocaine are chemically the same, but crack is the cheaper version of the two but it has flooded the poor inner-city areas where the minorities live. While cocaine is a very expensive drug and it is normally used by wealthy white people. This is an obvious attack on the minority as they cannot afford good lawyers most of the time so they end up going to jail, while the wealthy white people can afford a lawyer and they do …show more content…
According to CBC in 2014 about 7 million Canadians smoked weed, In the United States 25 million people have smoked weed in the past year, weed is also the most used illegal drug in North America. This shows that the war on drugs is not working because there are millions of people that are still using drugs regardless of consequences. Also a study conducted by UNICEF in 2006 noted that 4,700 Canadians between the ages of 12-17 were charged with a marijuana related offence. Now the Canadian government led by Justin Trudeau is considering legalizing the recreational use of marijuana. They are trying to adopt a system similar to ones in Colorado, Washington, and Oregon. Trudeau's plan is to legalize, regulate, and restrict the access to marijuana. If this happens the government will make a lot of profit from marijuana sales. Overall it would be a better idea to legalize marijuana as the government would no longer have to spend so much money on law enforcement and the correctional system, and that money can be used for education, healthcare also there would be no people getting charged with small offenses like possession of marijuana and getting a criminal record for such a small offense. Currently there are a lot of people across the country that are begging for the federal government to pardon them from their light charges like possession of marijuana, charges like these would affect a person's