"Re-Legalizing Drugs"
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 7:50 AM

On April 17, 2011, I gave a talk (yes, "Re-Legalizing Drugs") as part of the TEDxUChicago festivities. The whole 17-minute ordeal is viewable here.

Labels: drugs, licensing, Prohibition, self-exclusion

 
Beer During Prohibition
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:41 PM

Beer sales were illegal during national alcohol prohibition in the US, of course. Well, except for near beer, which had a level of alcohol below the Volstead Act's .5 percent limit. (Near beer is produced by making beer, and then removing the alcohol; hence, legal near beer provided various obvious channels to evade the Prohibition rules.) But there is another sense in which beer sales were not illegal during Prohibition -- at least part of Prohibition. Between April and December 1933, full strength (3.2 percent) beer sales were legal, although Prohibition was still in force. The freshly inaugurated President Roosevelt had Congress amend the Volstead Act, to redefine those illegal "intoxicating liquors" as containing more than 3.2 percent alcohol. So the brewers got an 8-month jump on the distillers in re-entering the legal market. Not everywhere, though -- state dry laws or a dearth of implementing legislation delayed the return of beer in a majority of states.

Last week saw the 75th anniversary of the return of legal beer to the US. The event was marked in the Los Angeles Times through an op-ed by Maureen Ogle. One can learn a lot about beer and beer history from her blog; here are the beer-related posts. Thanks to Alcohol and Drugs History Society for the pointer.

Labels: alcohol, Prohibition

 
Prohibition as Liberalisation
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:08 PM

During national alcohol prohibition in the US, beverages with trace amounts -- up to .5% -- of alcohol were not banned. But what about the rule in Islam, which also prohibits alcohol? How much of a trace of alcohol is necessary before the Islamic ban is triggered? According to a fatwa issued by a prominent Egyptian cleric, the answer is --- .5%! Who knew the lasting influence of the Volstead Act? In the case of the fatwa, some are worried that the .5% limit represents a dangerous liberalisation.

The Volstead Act did not make the purchase of alcohol illegal, and even alcohol possession was quasi-legal during Prohibition. So if we were to adopt Volstead Act-like standards towards our currently prohibited drugs, that would represent a dangerous liberalisation.

Labels: alcohol, Prohibition

 
A Federalism Quandary
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:28 PM

Back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, alcohol was taxed at the federal level, but illegal in some states. This created a bit of friction, as alcohol dealers (operating illegally within a state, if their alcohol was for beverage purposes, not industrial or sacramental or medical use) would sometimes pay their federal taxes. The federal tax rolls, therefore, could be used (and were used) to identify state lawbreakers. Some federal license holders tried to argue that state prosecutions based on federal tax payments violated the self-incrimination clause of the 5th amendment, but that argument generally was not availing. Some states (twenty-eight states, by 1917) even passed laws that made the payment of federal alcohol taxes for beverage alcohol a prima facie state crime. (See Chapter 5 in Richard Hamm's Shaping the Eighteenth Amendment.)

Today we are witnessing a curiously symmetric problem. Medical marijuana is legal in many states, but is illegal as a matter of federal regulation (except for those handful of patients who are provided with federal marijuana). States want to tax the sales, but what marijuana provider wants to provide tax records that could be used for a federal prosecution? I hope that the self-incrimination argument -- which on the merits seems to be airtight from the point of view of this non-lawyer -- proves to be more persuasive this time around.

Thanks to Radley for the pointer.

Labels: alcohol, federalism, marijuana, Prohibition

 
State Legislatures Respond to Grave New Threat
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 7:49 PM

Maybe in some benighted states legislators are slow to react to a significant new threat, but not in Missouri and South Dakota. The farseeing Solons of these midwestern edens are primed to prohibit the possession of alcohol vaporizers, which have been wreaking havoc throughout the land. The vaporizers allow someone to consume about half a shot of alcohol in twenty minutes through inhalation. This is such a wildly fun and addictive way to consume alcohol that injuries and deaths resulting from alcohol vaporizers are -- oh, wait, I can't actually find any evidence that anyone has ever been injured by these devices. You would think that when they introduce these bills they would mention some of the awful consequences that have sprung from the use of inhalers -- but nary a peep. Well, we better ban them anyway, just in case. (Incidentally, you could get a year in jail for alcohol vaporizer possession if the South Dakota bill becomes a law; try explaining that crime to your cellmate.) The prohibition will force people to get their alcohol from bottles -- and bottles are absolutely safe, right?

To be honest, legislators in Missouri and South Dakota are not that farsighted after all: more than 20 states have already banned alcohol vaporizers.

[It goes without saying that I am not suggesting in this post that alcohol vaporizers are perfectly safe.]

Labels: alcohol, inhaler, Prohibition, South Dakota

 
Opera Returns to Turkmenistan!
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 12:41 PM

There goes one of my favorite examples of misguided prohibition -- one that I like to compare with those drug prohibitions we are so addicted to in the US. You mean that people can perform opera in front of paying customers but (non-prescription) opiate possession in private is illegal? Turkmenistan has compounded its liberal folly by unbanning the circus, too, though I hope they will reconsider. Dance opponents, take heart: "It was unclear whether his [i.e., the Turkmen president's] order included the return of ballet." (Maybe if ballet performers sing a few bars they can fall under the opera exemption?)

Vice Squad is still on the road, but hopes to return to Chicago tomorrow.

Labels: Prohibition

 
Obamamania
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 11:06 PM

OK, Illinois's favorite son Barack Obama did not win today's New Hampshire election. Nevertheless, his candidacy is quite a phenomenon. Over at Marginal Revolution, Tyler notes how a former MR guest blogger pointed to the considerable Obama upside back in May of 2004. The loyal Vice Squad reader recalls, however, that our own Nikkie was ahead of the curve on this, writing of Obama in late March of 2004: "This guy is awesome - great ideas, level-headed, rational."

Moved to swearing by Obama's second place finish today, or perhaps want to dance at your table to celebrate the McCain or Clinton victories? Don't try any of that in St. Charles, Missouri, which "is considering a bill that would ban swearing in bars, along with table-dancing, drinking contests and profane music."

Labels: Prohibition, solipsism

 
Regulating Vice: Chapter 1, "The Harm Principle" (2)
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:42 PM

What if John Stuart Mill were the Drug Czar? What are the strictest drug policies that we could have that would be consistent with Mill's "Harm Principle" and the precepts of On Liberty? Interpretations of Mill can vary, of course, but in what I think are the most plausible interpretations, the libertarian-style philosopher would allow quite strict controls over drugs. What would be ruled out by Mill would be the criminalization of adult drug possession, as well as a medicalization-type regime in which drugs are available legally only via a prescription. Among the controls that would not run afoul of Czar Mill are bans on sales of those drugs, such as marijuana, for which sales are not really requisite for consumption; bans on advertising of drugs; high taxes on drugs; and buyer and seller licensing. While Mill would not allow a policy to be adopted if its purpose were to limit adult vice consumption, he would permit many policies that have other aims, but have the side effect of limiting adult consumption. Thus the high taxes, for instance, are OK (Mill goes further -- they are all but required) if their purpose is to raise necessary government revenue, even though high taxes will discourage drug consumption. And while I don't state it explicitly in Regulating Vice, I think that you could have a fairly restrictive, and quite adequate, drug control regime while staying within the bounds proposed by J. S. Mill.

Labels: Mill, Prohibition, Regulating Vice

 
Vice Legalization as an Anti-Corruption Strategy
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:22 PM

World Bank economist Branko Milanovic discusses all those corrupt countries out there with very poor governance. He sees the spread of corrupt countries to be connected with globalized trade and travel more generally. Thanks to globalization, "In corrupt states, profitability soars in the production of goods and services that are internationally illegal: drugs, sex trafficking, contraband weapons or cigarettes, or counterfeit goods." More trade allows further specialization in production, and some states specialize in the production or distribution of illegal goods, spurring capture of the state apparatus by organized crime. Hectoring politicians in corrupt countries to be more honest ignores the incentives created by these structural features:

A different approach is necessary: legalize the currently illegal activities like prostitution and drug use and modify the often draconian US and European immigration laws that stimulate human trafficking. If prostitution and drugs indeed became like haircuts and candies, their production would obey the same rules: Countries that export beauty services and confectionary products are not notably more corrupt than others.

Bad governance harms economic development. Drug prohibition leads to bad governance, even more so now that global trade has become much less expensive. Drug legalization, therefore, can promote economic development.

Thanks to SWOP East Sex Workers Outreach Project for the pointer.

Labels: drugs, Prohibition, prostitution

 
Marijuana Freakout
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 11:06 PM

The Freakonomics blog provides a public service today in the form of a debate concerning whether marijuana should be legalized. The Freaky final tally is three "yeas" and two "nays", plus some 60 comments or so. Pete goes the extra mile to point out the fundamental flaws in the "nay" arguments. To my mind, the "nay" position as articulated on the Freakonomics blog comes pretty close to the following pseudo-syllogism: (1) Marijuana is illegal; (2) marijuana is dangerous; (3) therefore, marijuana should be illegal. The naysayers don't really seem all that comfortable with actually punishing those dangerous pot users severely, though. Why not? After all, marijuana is illegal, marijuana is...

Dr. Robert L. DuPont's "nay" position starts out:

Legalization of alcohol would solve the alcohol problem the way legalizing speeding would solve the speeding problem: it would remove the legal inhibition of a dangerous behavior, and thereby encourage the behavior.

Oh, I did take the liberty of replacing his use of the word "marijuana" with "alcohol." I was led to this substitution out of hope. Dr. DuPont's famous namesake, Pierre du Pont, supported the Eighteenth amendment that ushered national alcohol Prohibition into the US. His firm, the Du Pont Company, manufactured munitions, and for safety reasons Du Pont forbade its workers from drinking. (Actually, it was only one of his firms; the remarkable Pierre had been president of both Du Pont and, later, General Motors.) But Pierre du Pont saw the effects of Prohibition, and following the lead of two of his brothers, became active -- indeed, all-but-essential -- in repealing the 18th Amendment; here's a photo of the dangerous radical, who had untold explosives at his disposal! How about it, Dr. DuPont? Any chance of a similar conversion?

Labels: marijuana, Prohibition

 
Alcohol Possession During Alcohol Prohibition
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:11 PM

Today is the 88th anniversary of the Volstead Act, the piece of legislation that fleshed out the details of what the 18th Amendment, the one that ushered in US national alcohol Prohibition, would mean in practice. The amendment itself outlawed manufacture, sale, transport, import, and export of "intoxicating liquors" for "beverage purposes". (What, possession and purchase not banned?; they just didn't know how to run a prohibition in those days.) The Act could have allowed beer and even wine to be exempt from Prohibition, but chose instead the "bone dry" standard of .5 of one percent alcohol content as the limit of what did not qualify as an intoxicating liquor. The beverage purposes clause in the Amendment was necessary to exempt sacramental, medicinal, and industrial alcohol. Cider of the sweet variety was exempt as was fruit juice, paving the way for legal hard cider and home wine production during Prohibition via court interpretation.

The Volstead Act actually did add "possession" to the prohibited activities -- see Title II, Section 3. This was followed by a restriction on the issuing of search warrants for private homes, however (Title II, Section 25): "No search warrant shall issue to search any private dwelling occupied as such unless it is being used for the unlawful sale of intoxicating liquor, or unless it is in part used for some business purposes...." This was followed (Title II, Section 33) by a further assurance that homes would be more-or-less off-limits to Prohibition agents: "But it shall not be unlawful to possess liquors in one's private dwelling while the same is occupied and used by him as his dwelling only and such liquor need not be reported, provided such liquors are for use only for the personal consumption of the owner thereof and his family residing in such dwelling and of his bona fide guests when entertained by him therein..."

Incidentally, it is also the 88th anniversary of President Wilson's veto of the Volstead Act -- within a few hours, his veto was overridden.

Labels: alcohol, Prohibition

 
Legalization and the Black Market
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 8:32 PM

In some areas where prostitution is legal, illegal variants of prostitution still seem to flourish. (They might be illegal because the prostitutes are underage, undocumented, or ineligible or unwilling to work in the legal sector for some other reason, or just for tax evasion.) I have often compared this situation with alcohol in the US, where the legal sector, though taxed significantly, seems to outcompete the illegal sector, almost eliminating it. Phil Cook's Paying the Tab, however, indicates that the comparative success of the legal alcohol sector after Prohibition was far from automatic. "Initial liquor tax collections were disappointingly low, in part because the bootleggers continued to supply something like 45 million gallons per year (66 percent of the tax paid amount) [p. 30, reference omitted]." The Feds responded with a massive surge in enforcement and some new regulations that aided their efforts, resulting "in a considerable shrinking of the black market by 1937 [p. 31]."

Labels: alcohol, Cook, Prohibition, prostitution, taxes

 
More on Absinthe's Presence
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 12:06 AM

The loyal Vice Squad reader will recall that an absinthe made from wormwood recently became available for sale on the US market, ending a nearly century-long drought. Forbes.com provides an article that explains the process of getting the absinthe, named lucid (uncapitalized), approved. One of the stumbling blocks concerned labeling; specifically, could lucid call itself “absinthe” on the label? The regulators were wary, because of what they seemed to regard as absinthe’s unsavory past. But they must not have been too wary – the compromise agreed to was to add an adjective, and a French adjective at that. lucid became an "absinthe supérieure" (which also suggests that absinthe is feminine).

Other legal absinthes (or absinthes inférieures?) are likely headed for the US market.

Labels: absinthe, alcohol, Prohibition

 
Anti-Prostitution Policing in Practice
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:07 AM

What should you do if you see a woman waving her arms on a street corner at 8AM? Try to offer assistance, perhaps? This is not recommended in the South Side of Chicago, not far from Vice Squad's own base. When a married couple, waiting for their daughter to return with a hot chocolate, found themselves in this situation, they soon realized that the woman was not in peril, but rather, was (seemingly) selling some physical companionship. They found the situation amusing. But only for a brief moment, until police officers arrested the male driver for soliciting their undercover officer. It was eight hours before he was released, while his wife and daughter were abandoned at the corner because the police impounded their car -- aren't civil asset forfeiture rules special? The charge against the driver was dropped, but the car has not been returned: "The city wants more than $4,700 in towing and storage fees if he wants the car back." Read all about this sterling piece of anti-vice police work here.

Labels: asset forfeiture, Chicago, policing, Prohibition, prostitution

 
A Vice Career
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 12:05 PM

Vice Squad has temporarily decamped for Baltimore, where today's Baltimore Sun contains this notice of the retirement of a police officer who spent half of his career with the, er, vice squad. I have no reason to doubt the integrity of this officer, but I found the story rather depressing. He recounts arrest after arrest, including those of the clergy members he collared (sorry) while posing as a male hustler, and of female prostitutes with various disabilities. (The story claims he made 5,000 prostitution arrests and 1,000 gambling arrests.) I recognize that under any regulatory system the public manifestations of prostitution have to be controlled, but our prohibition leads to so many unnecessary arrests, while simultaneously putting prostitutes at great risk from violent crime. The officer is a wine aficionado -- I hope that in his forthcoming book he can make the connection between social costs and vice prohibition.

The prostitution arrest drumbeat is every bit as regular, but not as intense, as the drug arrest drumbeat. Search Google News for 'prostitution' and you can read of the latest toll, in community after community in the US -- and all for behavior that in much of the world is neither illegal nor a matter of public interest.

Labels: policing, Prohibition, prostitution

 
High Profile Vice Revelations
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 10:27 AM

On the way to Tbilisi a week ago Vice Squad had a layover in London, where the dribbling out of confessions of prior illegal use drug use by leading British politicians was in the news. Guardian columnist Zoe Williams said that she wanted to record the complete tally, but that “it was like trawling through a list of first-world-war dead.” She notes how they never really admit to using pot, only to having “tried” it.

Before leaving the good ol’ US of A, a recurring news item there concerned prominent folks who may have “tried” an escort service or two, though certainly not for what you are thinking. Like the British weed smokers, they can’t come right out and just defend their activity, or announce that they have every intention of continuing in their vices. No, they have to pretend that their behavior was a Very Serious Error, though one that should be excused for some reason or other. (Williams points out that for the druggies, they like to point out that they were young, or the times were different then, or the misstep was so long ago as not to be an issue.) But on either side of the Atlantic, even though these prominent folks don’t actually defend their behavior, they also never seem to say how much better off they would have been if only they had been caught in their illegal act, arrested and jailed. The official, punitive approach is fine for those other folks, though.

Labels: Britain, drugs, Prohibition, prostitution

 
Whiteclay Revisited
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 11:17 PM

Fourteen people live in Whiteclay, Nebraska, it seems. Daily alcohol sales in Whiteclay amount to the equivalent of 10,000 beers: that's a Ruthian per-resident average of more than 714 beers per day.

Of course, it is not the residents who are buying all of those beers. Whiteclay is a creature of prohibition, in this case, the prohibition of alcohol sales within the neighboring Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. There are about 20,000 folks living on the reservation, and the majority of those who are in the labor force are unemployed. The alcohol problems on the reservation are staggering.

Activists have been trying for years to close the beer sellers of Whiteclay; last month, demonstrators blockaded the road linking the reservation with the village. But the alcohol continues to flow into the reservation, and it is far from certain that if Whiteclay were to disappear tomorrow, the situation would improve very much.

All of the information above is drawn from this recent story in USA Today. But it sounded sadly familiar to me, and sure enough, Vice Squad linked to a rather similar story on February 12, 2004. A quick comparison indicates that since that time, there has been a slight fall in the number of Whiteclay residents, a rise in the population on the reservation, and a rise in alcohol sales in the village.

Labels: alcohol, Native Americans, Prohibition, South Dakota

 
Smoking Ban Update
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 6:34 AM

Greetings from London, where Vice Squad arrived just in time to enjoy the least favorable (for US tourists) exchange rate in, oh, 26 years. So this posting will have to be short, as what US of A'er can afford British internet cafes?

The smoking ban implementation appears to be smooth. There were the ironic last legal smoking parties, paralleling similar gatherings when national alcohol Prohibition went into effect in the US. There are the malcontents, who include the musician Joe Jackson, who questions whether there's really any hard evidence that secondary tobacco smoke harms people (as Vice Squad noted in July 2004). And there's the pesky problem of what bars and restaurants will do with old ashtrays, the ones surviving informal removals by customers. And for the facts, we can turn to the Observer's malcontents article:

The Facts

· Shortly after the Second World War 80 per cent of men smoked. Today, about 24 per cent of the population continues to enjoy lighting up. Dramatic falls were seen in the Seventies and Eighties, but the rate of quitting has slowed to 0.4 per cent a year

· The government's wants just 17 per cent of Britons to be smoking by 2010

· The UK-wide smoking ban does not apply to three places: Alderney, Sark and the Isle of Man

· Smoking will also still be allowed in prisons, army barracks and care institutions

· 600,000 of Britain's 10 million smokers will give up as a result of the ban, the
government believes

· Age reduces addiction to nicotine. One third of 20- to 24-year-olds smoke, but just one in seven people over 60 do

· The Treasury takes over £4 of the typical £5.50 cost of a packet of 20 cigarettes in tax, and makes about £8bn a year from smokers

· It costs the NHS an estimated £1.5bn a year to treat smokers made ill by their habit

· Smoking kills about 100,000 Britons a year through cancer, lung conditions and heart problems. About 1,000 people a day are admitted to hospital in England with a smoking-related illness

Incidentally, between taxes and that exchange rate problem, a pack of decent cigs costs about $12 in London.

Labels: Britain, Prohibition, smoking ban, solipsism

 
Local Alcohol Prohibitions in Alaska, Australia
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 12:31 AM

Many Alaskan native communities in rural Alaska are officially dry. Indeed, they are drier than the US was during Prohibition (and drier than typical dry counties or municipalities elsewhere in the current US), as they have outlawed possession of alcohol. And these prohibitions might even "work". Researcher Paul Gruenewald (as quoted in this article), notes that “Although national prohibitions on alcohol are generally ineffective, and in terms of crime, counter-productive, local prohibitions can be very effective in reducing harms related to alcohol.” But even these prohibitions are being enforced with an extraordinary reliance upon informants, as a recent item in JuneauEmpire.com's Alaska Digest indicates:

FAIRBANKS - A tip line set up to try and bust bootleggers is heightening the police presence at Fairbanks International Airport, where alcohol and drugs are sneaked into rural Alaska aboard small planes.

The toll-free line was established in April. So far, airport police have received 40 tips.

The toll-free line, (877) TIP4FIA, is credited with nearly doubling the number of contacts officers make with passengers suspected of carrying illegal cargo. Three ounces of cocaine; up to eight gallons of beer and whiskey; and a pound and a half of marijuana have been confiscated, Officer Robert Dickerson said.

Australia has instituted some alcohol bans in Aboriginal areas, but recently the Prime Minister announced plans to take things much further in the federally-controlled Northern Territory. Specifically, alcohol and hard-core porn are both slated to be banned.

Labels: alcohol, Australia, policing, pornography, Prohibition

 
Cocaine in New York City
- posted by Jim Leitzel @ 11:11 PM

Today's New York Times runs an article in its Sunday Styles section about the prominence of cocaine in the city's nightlife (and in the lifestyle of the creative set more generally). There's a claim that the resurgence of coke use among young New Yorkers -- a resurgence that does not seem to have much statistical evidence in its support -- is in part due to 'generational amnesia.' The idea here is that the generation scarred by John Belushi's death was driven away from cocaine, but that the younger generation has not seen the same tragedies associated with the drug. This is a version of the usual 'new drug' problem. The use of addictive drugs tends to bring current pleasure and future pain. When a drug is new, few users are paying the cost, so it looks a bit better than it will turn out to be. New or rediscovered drugs develop better reputations, for a time, than they deserve. And the lack of a convincing statistical portrait of use is one of the raft of negative consequences stemming from drug prohibition.

'Coke is the new weed,' in terms of the acceptability of its open use in certain circles, according to one quote in the article. Another observer notes that the use of cocaine is much more socially acceptable than...smoking a cigarette. There's even a claim that the campaign against methamphetamine has made users think of cocaine as a safer alternative.

Labels: cocaine, methamphetamine, New York, Prohibition