Marijuana, cannabis, weed, pot. The most popular drug in the world goes by many names and it is about to see itself entering the legal market across the country. Marijuana has been viewed with great skepticism for many years by the government. In the 1970's, the government created the Controlled Substances Act which ranked substances according to their dangerousness and potential for addiction, and cannabis ranked schedule 1 at the top. It wasn't until California approved its usage for medical purposes that marijuana saw any support. Now 23 states have legalized the plant and support is ever so growing. The question is: will our society benefit from this? Will we see any improvement in crime from its legalization? Legalizing marijuana in the Sunshine State will bring many benefits to the criminal justice system, by lowering drug trafficking, re-allocating funds to other sectors and generating more tax dollars. Florida particularly is dealing with a lot of debate amongst citizens on the case, since in 2014 citizens voted on the amendment and only 57% of citizens voted for legalization, out of the 60% that was required. It showed just how close of a split there is with this issue. There were hopes for the amendment reappearing on the ballot this year but due to an inability by the United for Care organization, the organization leading the push for legalization, to raise enough votes it was unsuccessful. So now supporters' hopes are aiming at 2017 and beyond. Although the legalization did not happen the first time, it helped gain ground on the mission and just how the Chairman of United for Care stated, "This effort cost millions of dollars  --  but it needed to happen" (Sallum).

Some studies have discredited the medical benefits of marijuana saying that the negatives out-weigh them. A study that was performed at Harvard said that smoking recreational marijuana in even small amounts causes significant brain abnormalities (Frye). But other studies have discredited this saying it only applies to developing brains and reported that one in every six kids who start using marijuana will become addicted (Swanson). This is why the laws created regarding marijuana will keep the drug away from those who it will harm, just how laws for alcohol are in place. While there have been some evidence of negative side effects from cannabis, this is a problem that could easily be worked around.

On the criminal side Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd, president of the Florida Sheriffs Association, is leading the fight against legalization. He believes that if people are allowed to acquire marijuana, crime rates will increase and Judd makes a point that since Colorado's recreational marijuana law was passed, traffic accidents have skyrocketed. But to fight this, Colorado has responded by creating a new ad campaign that "reminds pot smokers to 'sober up' before driving" (Frye). It has been over three years since possession of marijuana has been legal in Colorado and there have been no signs of an increase of crime resulting from this legalization. And yet the police are still very involved in the fight against pot. Over 7 million people have been busted for possessing cannabis from 2001 to 2010 in the United States, and 52% of all drug arrests in 2010 were for marijuana, which meant that a cop made one cannabis bust every 37 seconds. Most of these arrests are simply for "small time crimes" and have a very detrimental and domino effect on the defendants who now have to go through the legal system. This could lead to problems at home or work. Legalization would "prevent marijuana consumers from the trauma of arrest and the damage caused by the 'scarlet letter' of a criminal record" (Rosenblum). In many cases, crime tends to focus much more on minorities and it applies to marijuana as well. Jess Swanson believes that "all crimes are focused too much on minorities. So the idea that you can legalize marijuana and solve social justice and move forward is laughable". She argues that legalizing marijuana will create even more disparity because of how there's eight times more liquor stores in poor neighborhoods and that it will be the same case with dispensaries, leading to more police surveillance. But the problem doesn't rely on the fact that those are poor neighborhoods and that it leads to more liquor stores, thus more crime, but simply because the police is required to patrol areas with more liquor stores to prevent robberies regardless of the social class of the neighborhood. For example, I am from Jacksonville, Florida and live in a nice neighborhood and the police patrol very frequently. Jacob Sallum conducted a research study on the race towards legalization and found that the opposition believes that this new law in Florida would result in allowing people that are not sick to get ahold of cannabis and that it will lead to "pot-assisted rape", yet marijuana has never been associated with violence (Sallum). 

There are some cases where the opponents of this law make good points. They believe that there can be alternatives to making cannabis legal; finding alternative sources to draw the same medical benefits, such as a rehabilitating facility for people with depression, which makes sense. Cannabis, however, doesn't take as much time or effort as it would take to go to a facility, or nearly as much money. CBD is the component in cannabis that draws the medical benefits. Swanson believes that this movement towards "medical marijuana" is actually more about legalizing THC, the psychoactive component. So to prevent this de facto legalization, legalizing something under a specific pretext but actually having other intentions, they are offering to encourage more efforts in improving the availability of CBD and disregard THC (Swanson). Protestors want more medical professionals assisting in crafting the bill, because even though it has medical purposes, they do not believe any doctors had any influence in the way it was written and therefore the bill should have a pharmaceutical context. That is a great point and should definitely happen, because it would show citizens just how serious the government is about wanting to give the people this miracle drug. Another concern that they have is that it will lead to a big market of abuse, that marijuana is 30 times stronger than it used to be and that it will have serious effects on the brain. This is why we need to have doctors that are very experienced with the drug to make good decisions about prescriptions for patients to prevent another pain pill mill situation that is already happening around the country. 

There are obviously some negatives to marijuana, but there is an abundance of benefits. The legal marijuana market is huge; it will hit $6.7 billion in sales in 2016, and generates $75 million annually in tax revenue in Colorado alone (Fox). Colorado is a great example of what could happen through legalization because it was the first to legalize recreational marijuana, and it could be noted that there has been no increase in crime rates resulting from the legalization. 

Chris Joseph, a writer for the Broward Palm Beach news, wrote about some of the recent cases that involved cannabis. A West Palm attorney won a case that successfully used medical necessity as a defense for pot charges against his client. He has now gathered other fellow attorneys and marijuana activists to form the Sensible Florida corporation and have developed a proposed amendment to the state for medical marijuana. The amendment would regulate cannabis the same way the government regulates alcohol, "it would allow anyone 21 or older to purchase and possess up to an ounce of marijuana and, if licensed, grow up to six plants at home" (Joseph). This is a good idea because it would create laws that make sense to citizens and would impede teenage use and prevent child addiction and harm to the young brain. It would also help against the problems happening in Colorado with DUI's. Public support is increasing significantly for cannabis: "a state poll released in October revealed 51 percent of Florida voters supported the legalization of personal use marijuana. Meanwhile, 90 percent of Florida voters support legalization of medical marijuana" (Keeley). 

There are a lot of medical benefits to marijuana, to name a few: used to treat Glaucoma, control seizures, stops cancer from spreading, relieve pain, slows the progression of Alzheimer's disease, eases the pain of multiple sclerosis, lessens side effects of treating hepatitis C. It also increases treatment benefits, treats inflammatory bowel diseases, relieves arthritis discomfort, keeps you skinny and helps your metabolism, improves the symptoms of Lupus, soothes tremors of Parkinson's disease, helps veterans with PTSD, and many more benefits. There are a lot of medical benefits to be seen from marijuana and there are even more than those listed. One big drawback that concerns many people is that cannabis will lead to lung cancer just like cigarettes, however a study conducted in 2012 published in Journal of the American Medical Association, shows us that marijuana does not impair lung function but it can even increase lung capacity. Researchers looked for risk factors of heart disease in 5,115 young adults over 20 years and tobacco smokers lost lung function over time, but pot smokers actually showed an increase in lung capacity. 

Another benefit to cannabis that isn't necessarily medical is that it increases creativity. Researchers have found that some participants improve their verbal fluency while using marijuana. Part of this increased creative ability may come from the release of dopamine in the brain, lessening inhibitions and allowing people to feel more relaxed, giving the brain the ability to perceive things differently. And finally, marijuana is great at helping people cut back on drinking. Marijuana may not be completely risk free, but it's much less harmful than alcohol. That is why people with disorders like alcoholism or abuse prescription drugs or other illegal drugs turn to cannabis because of its less adverse effects and is less likely to cause withdrawal problems.

It is easy to cut out marijuana from your thoughts and prevent progression to just keep things as they are. But is that the best choice? Although there are some negative effects to marijuana and some skepticism on whether or not it will improve society, but I see much more benefits that can be drawn from this legalization than keeping it away from the public. The government spends about $3.6 billion a year in every state fighting against marijuana, "the criminal justice system, ranging from police to corrections, now allocates a significant portion of its budgets arresting, prosecuting, sentencing and incarcerating marijuana users, dealers and others involved in the illegal drug infrastructure" (Austin). This is money that could be better spent fighting against more serious crimes. Legalization would also create a new market spurring creativity and new business and would generate about $75 million a year in tax revenue per state. 

The laws associated with marijuana are too strict at the moment, it labels defendants as criminals and leads to trauma associated with an arrest and what could be called a "domino effect" which would effect their entire lives. That's why in Miami a new law was created to decriminalize marijuana meaning that it allows "police officers to charge those in possession of less than 20 grams of marijuana with a $100 civil fine rather than a misdemeanor criminal offense" (Pollick). This saves a lot of money and time to the state and to the defendant. All in all, it is hard to not see all the medical benefits associated with it. Although there has been talk about harm to children, the West Palm attorney proposed an amendment to the state for medical marijuana regulating cannabis like alcohol limiting it to 21 and over and doesn't allow for driving under the influence. This would prevent younger citizens to obtain the drug whom it would harm the most. If we simply helped doctors weigh in on writing the bill, create a well crafted and safe laws, and consumers safely use the drug, marijuana would be a great benefit to society.

