@VenusFanelli People will commit crimes in spite of laws against them, but that isn’t logical justification for making any crimes legal.
I counter that if we can not learn from the mistakes of the past, we are doomed to repeat them. When the United States prohibited the sale and use of alcohol by with the Volstead Act, it did little or nothing to curb the consumption or production of alcohol in the US. What it did is drive production underground. The proliferation of “bathtub gin”, sometimes good, sometimes deadly; the arrest and prosecution of many otherwise upstanding citizens; the rise to power of organized crime; these are all symptoms that have effects that can still be felt in American society, a full century later.
Drug prohibition has more, wider reaching effects than alcohol prohibition. Any time there is a demand for a product, legal or illegal, a supply will turn up. That is the essence of capitalism. If there is a demand for heroin, and it can not be procured legally, guess what? Your friendly local street dealer can get it for you!
Look what’s happening in the legal marijuana industry. Here in Colorado, since pot was legalized for recreational adult use, millions in tax revenues have benefited schools and other great causes.
Pot has been called a gateway drug. The only gateway that pot has provided is access to the friendly local drug dealer. Entrepreneurs, legal or not, are always looking to make a sale.