Summary: Truth Behind The Smoke

Truth Behind the Smoke During the 1940’s marijuana was seen by the United States in a negative light and Americans believed it offered no positive impact to American society. Since this time America has slowly changed its view by legalizing marijuana for medicinal use in very few states. The full transition began, however, once the following states Washington, Colorado, California, and Oregon legalized the use of marijuana for medicinal and recreational use. The legalization of marijuana has caused the United States to see the positive effects through marijuana’s medical benefits, lower incarceration rate, and an influx of revenue for the government.
The first positive effect brought by the legalization of marijuana is its medical benefits.

Prisons are becoming a huge money pit to the American economy and are quickly becoming over populated. In fact in federal prisons “51% of all inmates are incarcerated for a drug offense and this is in comparison to only 1% of federal inmates incarcerated for homicide” (Klein 2013). The legalization of marijuana will drastically slow down the drug incarceration rate and will alleviate the problem of over populated prisons. By freeing up this space in the American prison system tax payer’s money can now be focused on fighting the war on terror, catching high profile criminals, and improving criminal justice resources. This has already been seen in New York, “According to the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, in the first year after the reforms, courts diverted 1000 drug offenders who would have served state prison sentences under the old laws” (Schoenfeld pg315). This decriminalization of marijuana has also had a positive impact to the violence associated with marijuana. Criminals selling, smuggling, or killing over marijuana in legal states has been reduced, due to the fact it is readily available to the public. Eradicating these criminals associated with marijuana will enhance public safety all across the United