President Joe Biden’s recent mass pardon for people convicted of non-violent marijuana offenses has the support of almost two-thirds of Americans, according to new polling. That may explain why even Republicans in Congress, who are reflexively critical of virtually anything Biden says or does, have been mostly silent in response to his historic move. Which makes this the right time to finish the reform by removing marijuana from the federal list of Schedule 1 drugs where, contrary to all reason, it sits alongside more dangerous drugs stuff like heroin, LSD and ecstasy.
Biden’s mass pardon of anyone convicted of simple possession of marijuana under federal law sounds huge, and it certainly has symbolic value. As he said in a statement released by the White House: “Sending people to prison for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit.”
People are also reading…
But it’s important to note that it didn’t actually release a single person from prison. That’s because most marijuana-possession convictions are at the state level, and so are unaffected by Biden’s pardon of federal convicts. Those affected total an estimated 6,500 people, all of whom have either served their time already or were never actually incarcerated. For that relative sliver of the population, the practical effect of Biden’s order is to clear their records — a significant thing for someone applying for a job.
But the symbolism is real, serving as confirmation that the administration, like most Americans, has moved on from the outmoded hysteria that defined America’s approach to pot for generations. A substance demonstrably less dangerous than cigarettes or alcohol shouldn’t be contraband in the way that heroin and other truly dangerous illicit drugs are.
Biden’s announcement included plans for a scientific review of the federal government’s current listing of marijuana among the most serious Schedule 1 illicit drugs. That listing has complicated state legalization efforts around the country because it blocks new state-sanctioned marijuana industries from conducting business directly with banks since, technically, those industries are still defined as criminal enterprises under federal law. If pot were removed entirely from the federal drug-scheduling system, that would solve the problem immediately for existing state legalizations and make new ones less complicated.
Biden also called for governors to follow his lead by pardoning all people convicted of simple possession under state laws, which could affect millions of people. But many Democratic governors have already done that and, perhaps predictably, Republican governors and other GOP politicians are rejecting the idea as an election-year stunt. They will have to come around eventually — society has fundamentally evolved on this issue, even in red-state America. Getting pot off the federal drug schedule is the best way to further that evolution.
Missourians will vote Nov. 8 on the full legalization of marijuana. Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft’s office on Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2022, announced that the campaign received enough signatures to go in front of Missouri voters.
Recent Comments