Some Random Thoughts About the War On Drugs
L. Neil Smith at The Libertarian Enterprise - as usual, Neil pulls no punches in describing the crime against humanity that is the war on some drugs. My take: try every government agent involved in the war on some drugs for kidnapping, or conspiracy to commit kidnapping. If convicted, execute every one of them at dawn, the day after the conviction.
Importantly, there is nothing in the Constitution--by which, under Article 6, Section 2, officials at every level of government are obligated to abide--that authorizes the banning of any substance or enforcing that ban with the threat of injury, incarceration, or death. The lawful powers of the federal government are enumerated in Article 1, Section 8, and they do not include forbidding drugs or any other substance. Politicians early in the 20th century understood this, and passed a Constitutional amendment allowing them to outlaw alcohol. No such amendment has ever been passed, or even proposed, with regard to drugs.
Given the number of turf wars, drive-by shootings, corrupted police and other officials, and invasions by police of the wrong address that are closely associated with the War on Drugs, it should be clear by now that drug laws and the attempt to enforce them cause vastly more destruction to individuals and society--and consume much more time, energy, and money--than the drugs in question ever did. We owe the existence and character of the police state which has sprung up all around us largely to government excesses in the name of the War on Drugs.
The production, processing, transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of drugs is, in fact, a Ninth Amendment right, exactly like the production, processing, transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of bread. All laws contravening the Ninth Amendment are unconstitutional and therefore illegal. Every agency and individual responsible for enforcing these laws is therefore an unappehended criminal.
America didn't have a drug problem before it passed drug laws...
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