It is inspired by some recent news from Canada:
Legalize pot, say former B.C. attorneys general – CBC News, 14 February 2012
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-c ... alize.html
Four former B.C. attorneys general are joining a coalition of health and justice experts calling for the legalization of marijuana.
Colin Gabelmann, Ujjal Dosanjh, Graeme Bowbrick and Geoff Plant have all signed a letter to B.C. Premier Christy Clark and B.C. NDP Leader Adrian Dix, calling on the politicians to endorse legalizing, taxing and regulating marijuana.
The former attorneys general say the move would help reduce gang violence associated with the illegal marijuana trade, raise tax revenues and ease the burden on the province's court system.
"As former B.C. attorneys general, we are fully aware that British Columbia lost its war against the marijuana industry many years ago," the letter reads.
"The case demonstrating the failure and harms of marijuana prohibition is airtight. The evidence? Massive profits for organized crime, widespread gang violence, easy access to illegal cannabis for our youth, reduced community safety, and significant — and escalating — costs to taxpayers."
'Dismayed' by mandatory minimum sentencing
The letter goes on to say that as attorneys general, the four men were responsible for overseeing the province's justice system and are well aware of the "burden" imposed on the court system by the enforcement of marijuana prohibition.
"We are therefore dismayed that the B.C. government supports the federal government’s move to impose mandatory minimum sentences for minor cannabis offences," says the letter. "These misguided prosecutions will further strain an already clogged system, without reducing cannabis prohibition-related violence or rates of cannabis use."
The letter goes on to compare today's marijuana laws to alcohol prohibition in the United States in the 1920s.
"It is time B.C. politicians listened to the vast majority of B.C. voters who support replacing cannabis prohibition in favour of a strictly regulated legal market for adult marijuana use," the letter reads. ...
In January the Liberal Party of Canada comitted to a resolution that states:
a new Liberal government will legalize marijuana and ensure the regulation and taxation of its production, distribution, and use, while enacting strict penalties for illegal trafficking, illegal importation and exportation, and impaired driving.