Chi Nguyen

Sierra Law
Con: Should marijuana use for recreational purposes be legalized in California?

On November 2, 2010, California voters were given the opportunity to vote for
Proposition 19, as known as Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010. However, the
result was that Proposition 19 has failed. Saying yes to Proposition 19 would have made it legal
for adults over twenty-one to possess up to one ounce of marijuana. It would also have been legal
for people to grow marijuana on up to 25 square feet of their property. Legalization would also
mean that local governments would have been free to raise their limits on cultivation and
possession as well as to license, regulate and tax sales of cannabis. (Doherty, 2011) Although
Proposition 19 has failed, it might be the beginning of the end for marijuana prohibition. It is
important for everyone to have the most basic knowledge of why legalization is a bad idea and
how it will negatively affect the state in different aspects. Firstly, consuming marijuana can
cause a variety of adverse health issues for users. It can affect different parts of the body such as
the heart, the lung, and the brain. Secondly, if marijuana becomes legal for recreational usage it
does not guarantee that young people will not misinterpret marijuana effects on health and
society. Since legalization of marijuana is for adults twenty-one and older it will still be illegal
for adolescents to purchase the drug which will lead to the black market continuing to exist.
Thirdly, legalizing marijuana will create problems for society. Legalization will increase the use
of marijuana and lead to increased social problems that will outweigh the tax benefits. Also,
marijuana would only be legal under state law, not federal, which could result in a huge loss in
federal funding. We agree that there are some benefits to legalizing marijuana but we firmly
believe that the costs outweigh the benefits.

Health impact associated with smoking marijuana

One of the major concerns of legalizing marijuana is that marijuana use can have a
cumulative impact on health overtime. The active ingredient in marijuana, THC, has been
reported to affect the dopamine reward system of the brain. This is the same neurochemical
process that reinforces dependence on other addictive drugs. (Joffe & Yancy, 2004, e632) Once
someone becomes used to the effects of marijuana and the way it makes them feel, they may
develop dependence to it. Research estimates that about 9% of users develop an addiction to
marijuana but this number increased to 17% among users who start young and up to 25%-50%
for daily users. (NIDA. 2010) Scientists have also discovered that withdrawal from marijuana
causes emotional stress. This is because it is linked to the corticotropin-releasing factor that is the
same brain chemical that has been linked to anxiety and stress during withdrawal from other
drugs such as alcohol and cocaine. Although there are no known chemicals in marijuana that
make it addictive, long-term marijuana abuse can lead to addiction of the drug. Addiction here
refers to compulsive drug seeking as well as abuse despite knowing the harmful effects of
marijuana upon functioning in the context of family, school, work, etc. (NIDA, 2010) When a
person uses marijuana in order to cope with problems, they develop even more of an addiction to
it. Studies have also shown that there is an association between marijuana use and increased
rates of anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts, and schizophrenia. These adverse effects can be
greatly amplified in young adults because their brains and bodies have not finished maturing.
High doses of marijuana can produce an acute psychotic reaction that can trigger the onset or a
relapse of schizophrenia in vulnerable individuals.
 Another health concern is respiratory problems. Regular marijuana smokers have more
symptoms of chronic bronchitis than non-smokers. (Hall, 1998) Marijuana smoke has been found
to contain 50-70 percent more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than tobacco smoke. (ONDCP, 2010)
Carcinogens are irritated to the lungs. Furthermore, tobacco smokers generally do not inhale as
deeply and hold their breath as long as marijuana users do. It means that smoking marijuana
further increase the lungs’ exposure to carcinogenic smoke. Although marijuana smoking has yet
been proven to be associated with lung cancer, nonetheless, marijuana smokers do have the same
respiratory problems as tobacco smokers. Symptoms include daily cough and phlegm
production, frequent acute chest illness, and risk of lung infections. (NIDA, 2010) The difference
between marijuana and cigarette packing is that marijuana is not filtered and is packed more
loosely than cigarettes; therefore it burns at a higher temperature leading to an increase in risk of
thermal injury to the lungs. (Weiss, 2008) Marijuana also weakens a person’s immunity to
infectious diseases such as pneumonia.
Besides, marijuana has been known to adversely affect the heart and the heart rate.
Marijuana has been proven to increase the heart rate by 20-100 percent shortly after intake. This
increased heart rate can last for up to three hours. Marijuana also increases the chance of having
a heart attack by a 4.8-fold increase within the first hour of smoking it. (NIDA, 2010) This is
because it increases the heart rate, affects the heart rhythms, causes palpitations and causes
arrhythmia. People who already have heart problems or who are at risk because of their age can
be affected more than the general population.
Smoking marijuana, in addition, affects the brain in number of ways. When someone
smokes marijuana, THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, rapidly travels from the lungs into the
bloodstream, which carries the chemical to the brain and other organs throughout the body. THC
acts upon specific sites in the brain, called cannabinoid receptors. According to the National
Institutes on Drug Abuse, the highest density of cannabinoid receptors are found in parts of the
brain that influence pleasure, memory, thinking, concentrating, sensory and time perception, and
coordinated movement. (NIDA, 2010) The use of marijuana slows the learning process down,
impairs memory, and impairs motor function. Researchers have done studies which indicate that
marijuana does have impairment to driving ability. Both cannabis and alcohol increase the time
that a person brake and start. Studies have shown a significant decrement in marijuana smokers’
ability to perform divided-attention task, such as driving. It is more dangerous when one uses
more because the larger the dose of marijuana used, the more impairment found on these mental
processes. (Dell & Snyder, 1977)

The black market

The black market will continue to exist because of youth’s incentive to use marijuana
illegally even after legalization. If marijuana were legal, it would become normalized for young
people because they would see people around them, such as their family and friends, using
marijuana. This would also decrease youth’s perceptions of risk associated with marijuana.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Technical report, the number of adolescents
who use marijuana is inversely related to the perceived risk associated with marijuana. (Joffe &
Yancy, 2004, e635) During the period in which Dutch prosecution of marijuana-related offenses
became virtually nonexistent, the number of young adults between 18 and 20 years of age who
had tried marijuana went from 15% to 44% and the proportion who reported using marijuana
within the last 30 days went from 8.5% to 18.5%. This reflects what would happen if marijuana
were legal in California. Also, legalizing marijuana will increase the use of marijuana among
adults and some of these adults might be parents. Adolescents are greatly influence by parental
drug use and seeing parents doing marijuana will lessen their perceived risks greatly. Under the
proposed law, marijuana would still be illegal for youths under 21, therefore youths would still
have to use illegal means in order to obtain marijuana. This would leave them with several illegal
options. They could purchase marijuana from drug dealers, obtain fake identification card to
purchase marijuana, or have their older friends buy it for them. The problems that are currently
associated with youths and marijuana would only be amplified with marijuana legalization.

Social issues
Finally, legalizing marijuana will create problems for society as well as worsen current
public safety problems. “Illegality of marijuana helps to keep prices higher and because drug use
is sensitive to price, especially among young users, higher prices help to keep use rates relatively
low.” (ONDCP, 2010) If marijuana became legal, the price would drop and consumption would
increase. Experiences with other drugs, such as alcohol and tobacco, show that legalization has
this effect. An increase in usage would lead to an increase in negative effects for society. These
negative effects would range from increased health problems and costs, increased use in youths
to increased crime. One big problem with marijuana is that there is no current scale to measure
impairment caused by marijuana. This makes it very difficult to measure marijuana’s actual
impact on public safety, especially when paired with other substances. According to the National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration, marijuana is the second most common drug factor in
crashes following alcohol. Severe impairment occurs especially when marijuana is paired with
other substances. When marijuana is paired with alcohol, it causes a 36% decrease in reaction
time. In another word, the mean reaction time increased from 4.65 seconds to 6.33 seconds.
(Sadovsky, 2000) This is a huge amount of time in terms of reacting while driving or operating
machinery.
Yet another concern is the public costs of attempting to regulate marijuana. These social
public costs would outweigh the revenue brought in from legal sales, including the tax revenue.
It is impossible to estimate the exact numbers but current alcohol and tobacco numbers can
reasonably provide an idea of these costs. According to the Office of National Drug Control
Policy, in 2007 federal and state tax revenues for alcohol total $14.5 billion dollars yet these
amounts are less than 10% of the $185 billion in alcohol-related health costs, criminal justice,
and lost workplace productivity. Tax revenue for tobacco currently yields $25 billion yet $200
billion is spent on the social costs of smoking. (ONDCP, 2010) From these numbers, we are
positive that the costs and tax benefits of marijuana legalization would follow the same pattern
with alcohol and tobacco. Also, under the proposed law, policy makers would likely continue the
penalization of large-scale cultivation and distribution of the drug outside the legalized
framework. Therefore, the cost of enforcement against unlawful manufacture, trafficking and
distribution illegally would possibly remain comparable with that of today. (Caputo & Ostrom,
1994, p484) In another word, legalization of the drug would not eliminate the costs that are
currently spent to enforce and penalize illegal activities surrounding marijuana. As the social
public costs rise due to increase in use, the tax revenue from legal sale would not be able to cover
all of these costs combined.
Nevertheless, a major setback is that if California legalized marijuana then it would still
be illegal under federal law. According to the Federal Controlled Substances Act, the federal
government could potentially cut funding to schools and non-profit agencies. This amount of cut
funding could total up to $9.4 billion. (Snavely, John, Ed.D, 2010) This also means that not only
would the state of California not be able to profit from marijuana legalization, but we might as
well lose the financial support from the federal government for school districts and other non-
profit agencies. Moreover, another impediment would come from the fact that under the
proposed law, hundreds of the state’s city and county governments could set their own
regulations for growing, selling, using and taxing marijuana. This would be a recipe for
regulatory chaos and attempting to regulate marijuana would be very costly.
As attractive as a potential tax revenue source as it might seem, marijuana legalization
would definitely lead to several negative issues for California. The health effects including
psychological dependency, respiratory problems and brain problems are known to using
marijuana chronically. Inhaling smoke into the lungs is never good even though its effects aren’t
as severe as tobacco and other illicit drugs. Legalization would have a great influence on the way
young people perceive the drug and its use. They would most likely become ignorant about the
health effects of cannabis smoking as well as the negative consequences on society. Adding to
the problem, California would not be able to cover the social cost arise from marijuana smoking
legality with the tax revenue that the proponents of legalization are hoping to collect. In
comparison with alcohol and tobacco, marijuana does not cause as much harm in terms of both
financial and health-related costs. However, permitting the legal use of marijuana, the second
most common drug factor in crashes, would be absurdly inconsistent and illogical practices of
the legal system.

Rebuttal argument for the Pro side

The first argument that the proponents of marijuana legalization have is that legalization
is a great potential revenue source for the state. According to the pro side, marijuana is
California’s number one cash crop in revenue a year and that the tax revenue is estimated at $1.4
billion dollars annually. They also state that legalizing marijuana would lead to a price decrease
of 50%, which would then increase consumption by 40% and then an excise tax that would
decrease this added consumption by 11%. Aside from the tax revenue brought in from
legalization, however, there is the social cost associated with it. Legalizing marijuana would
bring in tax revenue but it is not possible to predict how this amount would weigh against the
added social costs of legalization. A way to compare these costs is demonstrated above with the
alcohol and tobaccos costs. Legalizing marijuana would cause marijuana related costs to
increase. The marijuana social costs include medical and treatment cost, production loss,
research and education, etc. In the advent of legalization, there would also have to be money
spent to regulate the market as well as to enforce the new laws surrounding recreational
marijuana use. Although we agree that the marijuana market is a very appealing source for tax
revenue, we can’t ignore the costs of legalization that would likely outweigh the amount of tax
revenue brought in from legal sales. The potential revenue source argument would be irrelevant
considering these social costs.
Secondly, the fact that government regulation and cost reductions in prohibition occurred
if marijuana were to be legal is hard to accept. They state that the government would be able to
control the purity, potency, labeling, advertising and availability of marijuana. According to the
American Academy of Pediatrics’ Technical report, legalization actually could result in
advertising campaigns for marijuana’s use, which might directly target adolescents. We could
easily examine the same problem with tobacco. (Joffe & Yancy, 2004, e634) Tobacco companies
continued marketing to youth while disavowing any efforts to do so even after the
Comprehensive Tobacco Settlement, prohibition of advertising of tobacco toward youth, was
implemented. Therefore, attempt to control the advertising of marijuana after legalization may as
well be difficult to implement. Another trouble is enforcing the purity and potency of legal
marijuana. If marijuana were to become legal, the law states that it would be legal to grow and
cultivate up to 25 square feet of marijuana for personal use. It would be very complicated, if not
impossible, to control the purity and potency of this personal marijuana. Moreover, it would also
be very tricky to make sure that this supposedly personal marijuana be used personally.
The pro side also mentions that California spent nearly an estimate of $1.9 billion in law
enforcement costs for marijuana due to police resources, prosecutorial and judicial resources as
well as correctional resources. Legalizing marijuana would not make these costs disappear. With
number of use likely increases following legalization, we cannot guarantee that people wouldn’t
misuse the drug then drive under the influence. Because as we stated earlier, marijuana is the
second most common drug factor in crashes following alcohol even when the drug is not legal;
then we have a reason to believe that the number of driving under influence of marijuana might
increase after the drug is legal. The cost of accidents and medical treatment are expected to
increase as a result. Also, it is more difficult to know for a fact that someone drives under the
influence of marijuana because testing for impairment of marijuana is more evasive and costly
than testing for impairment of alcohol. A urine test, blood test or hair test must be administered
in order to test this. These tests are costly to implement and could take up to a few hours to get
result. We also have to take into account the costs for regulating the market, which would still
involve police resources, prosecution and correctional resources.
Last but not least, the argument of legalization taking away the money from drug cartels
and black market is also invalid. California is just one of the fifty-two states in the United State
marijuana market, therefore legalizing marijuana in only California would not have a huge
impact on the drug cartels revenues. We definitely agree that legalization would not completely
eliminate the black market and that legalization would increase supply and decrease prices.
However, we do not consent with the explanation that decreases in prices would lead to less
crime at the border and an overall safer society. According to the Office of National Drug
Control Policy, marijuana only makes up for a portion of the proceeds gained by criminal
organizations that make profit from drug distribution, human trafficking and other criminal
activities, so these groups would not stop continuing to operate because of legalization of
marijuana. Furthermore, higher taxes on marijuana would likely to provoke the drug cartel to
undercut the legal prices so that they could keep their market share. With the increased demand
for marijuana resulting from legalization, these groups and the demand for cheaper marijuana
might even grow stronger. (ONDCP, 2010)
If marijuana were to be legal, adults over twenty-one of age would be able to possess
marijuana and there would be no guarantee that they would not give them to youth under 21.
Having it legal would definitely decriminalize marijuana in the mind of youth, which makes
them more likely to use it, especially when they could easily get marijuana from older adult than
from drug dealers. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Technical Report on the
potential impact on youth of marijuana legalization, adolescents who think that marijuana is
relatively easy to get are approximately 2.5 times more likely to use the drug compared to those
who consider it hard to get. (Joffe & Yancy, 2004, e636) Legalizing marijuana may make the
borders safer to some extent but it will not protect our youths from having marijuana readily
available and decriminalized. The American Journal of Nursing estimated that about 14 percent
of Americans older than 12 have tried smoking marijuana at least once. (Dell & Snyder, 1977,
630) Of these, about 50 percent continue smoking. We cannot seem to calculate specifically how
these figures change after legalization, however, we could believe that the percentage would
likely increase due to perception of risk of the drug decreasing. Because marijuana use at an
early age is likely to affect educational achievement, legalization of marijuana then would have
huge impact on the younger generation. Early marijuana users have shown in studies to
accomplish less in high school. As a result, adult occupational status of these users would be
affected negatively due to low achievement in schools. (Green & Ritter, 2000, p41)
As we mentioned earlier, because marijuana would only be legal under state law, not
federal, there could be huge repercussions on our society and our schools. Not only the federal
government could cut funding to school districts and non-profit agencies, but the danger also lies
under the federal Drug-Free Workplace Act of 1988. It states that employers who receive more
than $100,000 in government funds need to keep employees free of drugs. (Wood, 2010)
However, if marijuana were legalized, the law would prohibit a district from using a positive
drug test for marijuana as a discriminating factor in employment. It would also forbid a district
from regulating any employee conduct relating to the use of marijuana unless school district
could prove job impairment associated with use. Or school district could also choose to maintain
a drug-free environment that is consistent with the federal law. This is to say that legalization of
marijuana would cost California K-university schools federal funding for being out of
compliance with the Federal Drug-Free Workplace Act requirements. (ACSA, 2010)
Furthermore, schools would not be able to control and punish teachers or bus drivers that show
up at work under the influence of the drug. It would not be safe for the children as well as the
environment of education.
In a nutshell, the benefits of marijuana legalization that were presented include the
potential tax revenue for the state, reduction in cost of law enforcement, and money would be
taken away from drug cartels as well as black market. We demonstrate above the reasons that we
believe these benefits eventually become irrelevant when weighing them against the costs of
legalization. Legalization would only leave adolescents to be the target of the black market for
marijuana. No matter how much revenue could be potentially generated from marijuana legal
sales, the cost of having the drug decriminalized in the mind of youth that eventually increases
use rate is immeasurable. The proponents of marijuana legalization fail to consider all of the
possible harmful impacts that smoking marijuana have on our younger generation. Through both
the financial and social standpoint, we’ve come to the conclusion that California should not
make marijuana legal for recreational purposes.