Open AccessHow Medical Marijuana Smoothed the Transition to Marijuana Legalization in the United States
Author(s) -
Beau Kilmer,
Robert J. MacCoun
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
annual review of law and social science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1550-3631
pISSN - 1550-3585
DOI - 10.1146/annurev-lawsocsci-110615-084851
Subject(s) - legalization , ballot , revenue , tax revenue , government (linguistics) , political science , population , state (computer science) , law , business , criminology , public administration , environmental health , medicine , psychology , voting , politics , finance , linguistics , philosophy , algorithm , computer science
Public support for legalizing marijuana use increased from 25% in 1995 to 60% in 2016, rising in lockstep with support for same-sex marriage. Between November 2012 and November 2016, voters in eight states passed ballot initiatives to legalize marijuana sales for nonmedical purposes-covering one-fifth of the US population. These changes are unprecedented but are not independent of the changes in medical marijuana laws that have occurred over the past 20 years. This article suggests five ways in which the passage and implementation of medical marijuana laws smoothed the transition to nonmedical legalization in the United States: ( a ) They demonstrated the efficacy of using voter initiatives to change marijuana supply laws, ( b ) enabled the psychological changes needed to destabilize the "war on drugs" policy stasis, ( c ) generated an evidence base that could be used to downplay concerns about nonmedical legalization, ( d ) created a visible and active marijuana industry, and ( e ) revealed that the federal government would allow state and local jurisdictions to generate tax revenue from marijuana.