Benjamin R. Patey
Gloucester Times
To the editor:
It is about time that we look at the question of drugs in a serious, intelligent manner. We live in a country that annually imprisons more of its citizens for nonviolent drug offenses than are incarcerated, for any reason, in all of Western Europe, which has a larger population.
Editorial staff
Fall River Herald News
Question 2 on the Massachusetts ballot, which would decriminalize possession of an ounce or less of marijuana, making it a civil offense, is not a moral or a social issue, nor is it a drug abuse issue.
It is purely a financial issue.
Jacob Sullum
Reason: Hit & Run
In August pollsters at Boston's Suffolk University said Question 2, a Massachusetts ballot initiative that would replace criminal penalties for possession of up to an ounce of marijuana with a $100 civil fine, "appears all but certain to pass," with support from 72 percent of registered voters. "The public may be signaling that pursuing small-time marijuana users is a waste of taxpayer resources," said David Paleologos, director of Suffolk's Political Research Center. "This issue suggests that there is a libertarian streak in the thinking of Massachusetts voters." Last week the same pollsters found support for the measure had shrunk to 51 percent, with 32 percent of voters opposed (up from 22 percent in August). Maybe Massachusetts voters have become less libertarian in the last two months.
Or maybe, as NORML's Paul Armentano suggests, they've been paying too much attention to the cops and prosecutors behind the Coalition for Safe Streets.
Patrick Cox
Associated Content
Lowell, Massachusetts -- On November 12, a Wednesday, voters in the state of Massachusetts will decide on an issue which has rustled state and federal officials since the inception of banning on marijuana as a plant, and its active alkaloid compounds altogether. This is issue is the decision of whether posession (by an adult) of small amounts of marijuana (less than one ounce, 28 grams) should be punished with criminal or less severe civil offenses.
Editorial staff
Belmont Citizen-Herald
Voting to decriminalize small quantities of marijuana might be seen as a difficult proposition and there are some legitimate concerns with this proposal. But the positives clearly outweigh the negatives.
