Legalize Drugs Now!

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, The, July, 2000 by Meaghan Cussen, Walter Block

WALTER BLOCK [*]

An Analysis of the Benefits of Legalized Drugs

ABSTRACT. The legalization of drugs would prevent our civil liberties from being threatened any further, it would reduce crime rates, reverse the potency effect, improve the quality of life in the inner cities, prevent the spread of disease, save the taxpayer money, and generally benefit both individuals and the community as a whole. Our arguments are based on a basic appreciation of the benefits provided by voluntary exchange and the role markets play in coordinating human activities. Legalizing drugs would eliminate many inconsistencies, guarantee freedoms, and increase the effectiveness of the government's anti-drug beliefs. The present war on drugs has not and will not produce a decisive victory. We advocate a new approach to this important social problem.

Drug dealers are a thing of the past. Violent crimes and theft are greatly reduced. Drug-related shoot-outs are unheard of. The streets of America begin to "clean up." Communities pull themselves together. Youths and adults once involved in crime rings are forced to seek legitimate work. Deaths due to infected intravenous needles and poisonous street drugs are eliminated. Taxpayers are no longer forced to pay $10,000,000,000 to fund drug-related law enforcement. The $80,000,000,000 claimed by organized crime and drug rings will now go to honest workers (Ostrowski 1993, pp. 203-205). What policy change will bring about such good news? The legalization of drugs! Both practically and philosophically speaking, addictive drugs should be legalized.

I

Basic Constitutional Rights

MANY ARGUE THAT drug prohibition protects addicts from themselves by exerting parental control over their behavior. This government-enforced control, the anti-drug laws, strictly monitors addicts' treatment of their own bodies. For example, the government decides that it wants to protect Fred Brown from destroying his body. The government, therefore, outlaws narcotics and, in effect, takes control of Fred's body. Under the United States Constitution and the anti-slavery laws, this hegemony should not happen. The guiding principles of the United States, iterated both in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, protect Fred's basic civil liberties to "pursue his own happiness" as long as he doesn't infringe on others' rights to life and property. With prohibition, Fred no longer has this constitutional right. He no longer controls his own body. Regulation has stripped him of his civil liberty. Fred's role of "owner of his own body" is taken away from him. This has in effect made him a slave.

Are we being hysterical in categorizing present drug law as a form of servitude? No, our drug laws amount to partial slavery. We must all question the practices of roadblocks, strip-searches, urine tests, locker searches, and money laundering laws. Philosophically speaking, drug prohibition severely threatens our civil liberties and is inconsistent with the anti-slavery philosophy and the founding documents of the United States. The legalization of drugs would give a basic civil liberty back to U.S. citizens, by granting them control over their own bodies.

II

Free Trade

FREE TRADE benefits all parties. It can be assumed that if drugs were legalized, and thus were a part of the market, both the buyer and the seller would gain. Each time a trade occurs, the welfare of both parties is improved. If Joe sold you his shirt for $10, he would benefit because he obviously values the $10 more than the shirt. If he didn't, he would not have traded it. You would also gain from the trade because you obviously value the shirt more than you do the $10. If you didn't, then you would not have agreed to the deal. Free trade in the drug market works the same way. If Joe sells you marijuana for $10, he gains because he values the money more, and you gain because you value the drugs more. Whether or not another person thinks you should value the drugs more is not the question. That third party is not involved in the trade. The amount of pleasure the drug brings you is your motivation for buying it. Trade is a positive-sum game. Both parties gain, at least in the ex ante sense.

It cannot be denied that certain third parties will be offended by the drug transaction, on moral or ethical grounds. However, try to find any transaction that does no offend at least one person. Many people object to the sale of alcohol, cigarettes, birth control or animal products, but their feelings or beliefs do not stop these items from being sold. Marxists object to any market transactions because they see commercial activity as necessarily exploitative. There is obviously no pleasing everyone when it comes to market transactions. In our free enterprise economy, however, anyone who participates in the market will benefit from it. "...For all third parties who say they will be aggrieved by a legalized drug trade, there will be many more benefiting from the reduction in crime" (Block 1993). "A third party can verbally oppose any given trade. But that opposition cannot be revealed through market choices in the same way that trade between the two parties indicates a positive evaluation of the transaction" (Block 1996, p. 434). Free trade of all goods contributes to the number of those who gain. In a free market economy, everybody has opportunity to participate in the market, and therefore, equal opportunity to gain in a positive sum transaction.