War Against Drugs: Prohibition causes crime not drugs.

National prohibition of alcohol (1920-33)--the "noble experiment"--was undertaken to reduce crime and corruption, solve social problems, reduce the tax burden created by prisons and poorhouses, and improve health and hygiene in America. The results of that experiment clearly indicate that it was a miserable failure on all counts. The evidence affirms sound economic theory, which predicts that prohibition of mutually beneficial exchanges is doomed to failure.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html

Medical Marijuana: Broad-spectrum relief from a variety of ailments.

Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Nevada, and Oregon have adopted measures to allow patients access to this beneficial drug, which has been found to provide
broad-spectrum relief from a variety of ailments.
http://www.kucinich.us/issues/medicalmarijuana.php

Industrial HEMP: An acre of hemp produces more pulp than four acres of trees.

The industrial hemp plant has a surprising number and variety of uses, including textiles, paper, food, paint, bio-fuels, bio-composites, automobile parts, plastics, bio-fuels, bio-composites, and fiberboard. In ancient times, people added handfuls of hemp fiber to their clay to strengthen the bricks used for building.  In France today, houses are being built from hemp that are fire- and termite-resistant. Tree-free hemp paper can be made without dioxin and can be recycled 10 more times than tree-pulp paper.  An acre of hemp produces more pulp than four acres of trees.
http://www.kucinich.us/issues/hemp.php
 

Marijuana and Criminal Justice: A War against Civil Liberty and Human Rights.

For more than a decade, state and federal officials have invoked the language of war in an effort to
eradicate the use of those drugs the government has decreed illicit. Since then state and federal governments have spent billions of dollars on drug courts, law enforcement, foreign aid, and treatment and prevention programs. Prisons now teem with drug offenders, and asset forfeiture laws have enabled police to confiscate millions of dollars in property from citizens merely suspected of involvement in drug trafficking. The U.S. prohibition on certain drugs has effected direct repercussions on domestic and foreign policy, criminal justice, public safety, personal liberty, health care and countless other spheres of society.
http://www.cato.org/current/drug-war/
 

LINKS:           http://www.csdp.org/links.htm          Criminal Justice Dave Kopel         ACLU