More Idaho Authoritarianism

The Idaho legislature is proposing a

Neighboring Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and Montana have almost entirely decriminalized marijuana. Spokane-area dispensaries even advertise on the radio, but good luck if you want to buy a rifle or pistol magazine with more than a 10-round capacity. Even Utah has relaxed on medical marijuana. But this is about Idaho again, the state

The government has been fighting a "war on drugs" for decades, and objectively, the drugs are winning. The Iron Law of Prohibition states, "the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs." As governments crack down on a prohibited substance, the incentive is to make or smuggle the most concentrated form. Right now, the opioid crisis has spiraled to the point that deadly fentanyl overdoses are a common concern. Much of the US border debate centers on drug smuggling from Mexican cartels. We see once again the alliance of bootleggers and Baptists as one seeks the outrageous profits of black market trade, and other other the sense of moral superiority as they try to coerce society into holiness.

Image by Julia Teichmann from Pixabay

I would generally advise against drug consumption, but as Lysander Spooner wrote in

It is not often possible to say of those acts that are called vices, that they really are vices, except in degree. That is, it is difficult to say of any actions, or courses of action, that are called vices, that they really would have been vices, if they had stopped short of a certain point. The question of virtue or vice, therefore, in all such cases, is a question of quantity and degree, and not of the intrinsic character of any single act, by itself.

100 years ago, the US was deep into alcohol prohibition. Beer and wine had been replaced by whiskey and gin as the favored source of alcohol. The aforementioned "Baptists" had gone so far as to enact a constitutional amendment. Corn whiskey had been part of Appalachian history since colonial times, but from 1920-1933, independent bootleggers and organized crime ran the alcohol industry not unlike the drug-importing cartels, local street gangs, and underground marijuana growers of today. Alcoholism was a "public health crisis" and "moral imperative for legislation" then, to borrow modern terminology.

I drink a beer or two now and then, and have been known to enjoy a Moscow Mule. I don't like to get drunk. However, I know people who can't handle alcohol, and are prone to addiction. Continuing from the previous quotation, Spooner also adds,

This fact adds to the difficulty, not to say the impossibility, of any one’s—except each individual for himself—drawing any accurate line, or anything like any accurate line, between virtue and vice—that is, of telling where virtue ends, and vice begins. And this is another reason why this whole question of virtue and vice should be left for each person to settle for himself.

I know people in Idaho who consume marijuana recreationally or medicinally. They harm no one. Their vices are not inherently criminal. However, robbing them of $300 would be. Making such robbery "legal" does not alter its criminal nature. Even setting aside marijuana and focusing only on "hard drugs,"

is by far a more dangerous opiate than anything smuggled from Mexico.

Prohibitions and fines are a classic example of the politician's syllogism, "We must do something, and this is something, so therefore, we must do this." I think most people want to blame those afflicted by vice for driving the black market and creating its dangers, but in reality, it is government action with the stated intention of "saving society from itself" which turns vices into deadly crises. Remember also that most of the deaths and injuries from alcohol were not inflicted by careless bootleggers, but by government poisoning industrial alcohol supplies.

Idaho legislators may have the best of intentions, but this policy is short-sighted and misguided. It will result in greatest harm to those least able to pay, and turn innocent people into "criminals." This isn't how we help people in need or protect the public. Shame on Idaho for even considering this action.

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