narcotics and drugs

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Narcotics and Drugs: Should Marijuana Be Legalized
The discussion on the legalization of marijuana goes on all over the US despite the fact that a lot of states have legalized medical marijuana. Researchers and the opposition remain adamant that making marijuana legal will increase the risk of juveniles assuming its harm and the dangers of using the drug (Joffe & Yancy 634). The pro-legalizing team argues that the drug can be beneficial economically, medically, and practically to the country. This essay notes the views from the interested parties on the issue of the use of marijuana by considering the facts on its pros and cons, concluding on whether it should be legalized or not.
For many years, marijuana has been prohibited across the United States, and to be convicted with growing, possessing or selling marijuana meant receiving sentences of incarceration. Criminal penalties for possessing small quantities of marijuana were loosened for 12 states by either scrapping or significantly reducing them (Joffe & Yancy 635). Many observers were convinced that it would not be long before the drug was legalized. However, the federal movement stepped up its stand on the usage of the drug in 1978, and since then, no state has decriminalized marijuana. The 1970s liberalization's end is associated with parents' movement, which responded to the rapid rise in regular use of marijuana among school students in junior and senior high, and the harms it is associated with (Caulkins et al. 76).
Recently, a few states that include California in 2012 and Vermont in 2013 have entirely decriminalized the possession of small quantities of marijuana for medical purposes (Joffe & Yancy 637). Marijuana is now used for medical purposes in more than 20 states, but with a great variation in how it is supplied and consumed. In 2010, California would have allowed large-scale commercial production of marijuana for recreational use in a close passage of a ballot. This inspired and favored legalization in other states such as Colorado and Washington in 2012. Oregon nearly did it too. In November 2014, voters in Oregon, Alaska, and Washington D.C., also passed initiatives to make marijuana legal. Other states including California are expected to propose or legislate on the possibility of legalization of the drug. Being a presidential election year, 2016 should see more states vote on the legalization of the drug (Hughes).
It is important to note that legalization is not just a two faceted question between producing, selling, and possessing of marijuana legally on one side and continued the prohibition on the other. Making marijuana legal covers a wide range of possible laws that can be told apart in at least four different ways (DEA 62). These are what organizations should provide the drug, the policies put in pla...