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I think you are forgetting why drug laws were imposed in the first place. In the 19th century it was possible to get hypodermic needles and opium through the post, bought from a catalog.

When it really became a problem is when heroin was introduced in 1898 by Bayer. It was introduced as a cough syrup and cure to a lot of ills - the ecstatic feeling it produced seeming to prove this. However the amount of addicts began to pile up, and the first anti drug laws in the 1920's were a recognition that it was getting out of hand as a public health problem. It was estimated in 1925 that there were 200,000 heroin addicts in the United States alone.

Even so, the drug laws of the 1920's didn't eliminate the drug, you had to have a prescription to get it. It wasn't until the Nixon administration that the DEA was created.

What do we learn from this - several things, that Burke was correct, "men are apportioned liberty in so far as they have the ability to constrain their appetites....men who are slaves to appetite are no longer free, their passions form their fetters". As society has grown increasingly out of control on this subject, laws have reacted to try and save the balance. There is no reason to believe that legalisation would do anything except increase consumption, due to lower prices and the public health problem, to say nothing of the problem of irresponsible citizens littering up the landscape.

Some drugs should be legalised and controlled; pot is an example. But hard drugs, forget it.

Regards, Ivan

I think you are forgetting why drug laws were imposed in the first place. In the 19th century it was possible to get hypodermic needles and opium through the post, bought from a catalog.

The drug laws were imposed to give the booze police something to do (other than getting real jobs) after prohibition ended.

Nope, I'm not forgetting the rationalizations for drug laws. [good summary, btw]

I'm attempting to point out that prohibitory law, - the banning of property, - is unconstitutional.

Works for guns, applies equally to 'drugs', -- Both can be dangerous possessions when used by immature/deranged individuals. -- Thus the key is constitutional methods of regulating public use, not prohibition.