political science

I personally believe that the federal government of the United States has the right to ban states usage of both medicinal and recreational marijuana entirely due to the Supremacy Clause. This is because the Supremacy Clause states that when there is conflict between a state and the country that the country has the power to make the decision on what goes and what does not. With that being said i do believe that it should be up to the states to decide how to enforce marijuana and other drug laws because our country because no states are the same so therefor should not be governed completely the same. With the government allowing states to police here own laws it should be up to the states to decide what they want to do with marijuana because it can be incredibly beneficial to some states as seen in Colorado when it helped generate tons of money for the school systems. I personally believe that marijuana should be legalized recreationally in the United States just for the simple fact that alcohol is legal in the united states. It is statistically proven that there are far more alcohol related deaths each year than there are marijuana related deaths each year. It is also impossible to overdose on weed when it is very possible to drink yourself to death in one night. I also feel it should be legal because it will make the drug safer and will help generate lots of revenue.

Through my understanding of federalism, states have the right to legalize marijuana, even with the Supremacy Clause. The reason our country has a federalist system is so both the federal and states government can co-exist and not interfere with one another, however, the Supremacy Clause seems to negate that by stating “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States … shall be the supreme Law of the Land.” The reason why the Supremacy Clause is included in the US Constitution is to legitimize the power of the federal government; without it, states could theoretically reject every federal law, making the states’ government appear more powerful than then the federal government. Even though marijuana is illegal and classified as a schedule 1 drug under the Controlled Substance Act of 1970 at the federal level, the reason why states have the right to legalize marijuana is under the 10th Amendment, which states “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution … are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” I believe that drug enforcement should be handled at the state level since it should be a state’s decision to legalize marijuana. Since Colorado and Washington legalized marijuana, it has proven to be a great source of revenue, which is extremely important in this difficult economic climate. I personally strongly agree to the legalization of marijuana for the sole factor that it can provide states with a large amount of new revenue.