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Is the U.S. Drug War unConstitutional?

"I had not noticed any hares here, but if you mean splitting hairs, I guess you're close to being right." T7 #22
Oh! What a terrible propeller!
"No one is levying war against the United States" G4 #23
Congress is, according to the Constitution.
"No. Why do you think drug laws have anything to do with aiding and abetting the nations enemies?" j #24
For precisely the same reason Nobel laureate economist Dr. Milton Friedman said it does.

Nice and slow:

a) Q: Are the extremely wealthy illegal drug kingpins like Pablo Escobar enemies of the United States?
Hint: the answer is: yes they are. And if they are not, then why the %$#@ are we waging War against them?!

b) Q: Why are they so wealthy? Didn't el Chappo show up on the Forbes 500 list?
Their drug is illegal. And they earn vast $fortunes with it.
How many liquor store owners (legal) do you know that command vast $fortunes?

c) As Dr. Friedman explains, it's the black market, it's the prohibition, it's the "Drug War" that boosts their profits.
Remove the prohibition (as we did with our 21st Amendment), and the spectacular profit margins drop out from the bottom of the market.
"BTW, Treason is not the only crime defined. There's also piracy and counterfeiting." j #25
Excellent!

Please post the precise Article number and Section number for each of those DEFINITIONS so that we may read those Constitutional DEFINITIONS and learn from you legal expertise.

Thanks.

PS
I just completed two separate character string searches in our Amended Constitution.

- One for "piracy". I got zero hit. To my knowledge that character string is not in the United States Constitution.

- The other for "counter". I got only one hit, in ARTICLE 1. SECTION 8 - 6

Art.1 does not DEFINE "counterfeiting". Instead it is merely designated as punishable there. Art.3 Sect.3 DEFINES treason.
 
Art.3 Sect.3 defines treason, the only crime defined in the Constitution.

a) Does Drug War violate Art.3?

b) If not, why not?

c) If so, what should the Trump administration et al do about it?

Well, I certainly don't think the people drug addicts are subsidizing have the United States' best interest in mind....,
 
Art.3 Sect.3 defines treason, the only crime defined in the Constitution.

a) Does Drug War violate Art.3?
Nope.

Congress is empowered to pass laws regulating behavior, as long as it isn't ruled out by the Constitution.

It's a bad policy, but yes, federal drug laws and federal drug enforcement are Constitutional.


c) If so, what should the Trump administration et al do about it?
They should decriminalize marijuana, and focus resources on addiction treatment programs. They also need to crack down on legal opiate use.
 
Art.3 Sect.3 defines treason, the only crime defined in the Constitution.

a) Does Drug War violate Art.3?

b) If not, why not?

c) If so, what should the Trump administration et al do about it?

I have no idea what you are trying to say. How is the fact treason is defined in the Constitution relevant to the question whether federal laws against certain drugs comply with the Constitution?
 
Quote Originally Posted by sear View Post
Art.3 Sect.3 defines treason, the only crime defined in the Constitution.

a) Does Drug War violate Art.3?

b) If not, why not?

c) If so, what should the Trump administration et al do about it?

"Well, I certainly don't think the people drug addicts are subsidizing have the United States' best interest in mind....," T1 #27
You think Sir Paul McCartney is a terrorist? He smokes up a storm.

You think U.S. Presidents Bush & Obama are terrorists? They're both believed to have used marijuana extensively.

Their commerce may benefit the criminals. But I doubt their primary objective is that kind of harm.
Instead, for most of American history, there was no Drug War.
And we had nowhere near the problems with drugs then that we do now.
So by what dint of Promethean reasoning would you blame the commodities retail purchasers, and not the ridiculous & dysfunctional prohibition that causes the problem?

Remove the prohibition, and the benefit to criminals vanishes.
el Chappo didn't want Drug War to end any more than the most rabid U.S. Drug Warrior. They BOTH benefit!!
a) Does Drug War violate Art.3?

"Nope."
"Congress is empowered to pass laws regulating behavior, as long as it isn't ruled out by the Constitution." V #28
Correct.
There's no congressional / legislative (or judicial or executive for that matter) exemption to the prohibition against perpetrating or conspiring to treason.

And Article6 Section2 is quite clear and emphatic on that fine point of Constitutional law.
ARTICLE 6.
2 This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
V #28 then opines:
"It's a bad policy, but yes, federal drug laws and federal drug enforcement are Constitutional." V #28
Oh?
Then why was Amendment #18 ratified, before they waged Prohibition in earnest?

And if it was extraneous, why did they then repeal it with Amendment #21?

If was necessary with ethanol, why not with THC?

Your position is amusing, but clearly contradicted by the facts.
"They should decriminalize marijuana, and focus resources on addiction treatment programs. They also need to crack down on legal opiate use." V #28
That opinion is widely prevalent.
And the States have clearly tired of the overbearing federal martial oppression against their Peoples So they've done end-runs around the feds, both for medical marijuana, and for recreational marijuana as well.

And just as predicted, notably in Colorado, it has been a sensational success. Any idea how it's going in the great Northwest?
In Colorado it has not merely pulled the rug out from under the criminal marijuana markets throughout the State.
I has also provided many $millions in windfall $tax $revenue for Colorado.

Has it not also decongested the criminal justice system there?
 
Nope.

Congress is empowered to pass laws regulating behavior, as long as it isn't ruled out by the Constitution.

It's a bad policy, but yes, federal drug laws and federal drug enforcement are Constitutional.



They should decriminalize marijuana, and focus resources on addiction treatment programs. They also need to crack down on legal opiate use.

Could you point me to that part of the document that empowers the government to "regulate behavior", specifically in this case, what the citizen ingests? I won't hold my breath. :mrgreen:
 
Oh! What a terrible propeller!

Congress is, according to the Constitution.

For precisely the same reason Nobel laureate economist Dr. Milton Friedman said it does.

Nice and slow:

a) Q: Are the extremely wealthy illegal drug kingpins like Pablo Escobar enemies of the United States?
Hint: the answer is: yes they are. And if they are not, then why the %$#@ are we waging War against them?!

b) Q: Why are they so wealthy? Didn't el Chappo show up on the Forbes 500 list?
Their drug is illegal. And they earn vast $fortunes with it.
How many liquor store owners (legal) do you know that command vast $fortunes?

c) As Dr. Friedman explains, it's the black market, it's the prohibition, it's the "Drug War" that boosts their profits.
Remove the prohibition (as we did with our 21st Amendment), and the spectacular profit margins drop out from the bottom of the market.

Excellent!

Please post the precise Article number and Section number for each of those DEFINITIONS so that we may read those Constitutional DEFINITIONS and learn from you legal expertise.

Thanks.

PS
I just completed two separate character string searches in our Amended Constitution.

- One for "piracy". I got zero hit. To my knowledge that character string is not in the United States Constitution.

- The other for "counter". I got only one hit, in ARTICLE 1. SECTION 8 - 6

Art.1 does not DEFINE "counterfeiting". Instead it is merely designated as punishable there. Art.3 Sect.3 DEFINES treason.

I suspect you realize that the term "war on drugs" is a slogan, something meant to enlist the citizens, a figure of speech?
 
Could you point me to that part of the document that empowers the government to "regulate behavior", specifically in this case, what the citizen ingests? I won't hold my breath. :mrgreen:

Its right after the education is a federal power clause and right before the federal definition of marriage clause. ;)

I really liked the the idea of a federal crackdown on legal drug use - that should be interesting to watch. ;)
 
"Could you point me to that part of the document that empowers the government to "regulate behavior", specifically in this case, what the citizen ingests?" T7 #31
Please do not misunderestimate me. There is none.

TO THE CONTRARY !!
According to the 9th Amendment (and the 1st), if it was legal at the time of ratification, it should be legal now.

The First Amendment argument is quite simple. The Holy Bible grants dominion by man over the herbs of the field. That should surely cover hemp / cannabis / marijuana, & perhaps heroin, cocaine, and coffee as well.
The War against marijuana is therefore a usurpation of our free exercise clause religious freedom right; albeit legitimately limitable in public places due to for example 2nd hand smoke concerns, etc.
"I suspect you realize that the term "war on drugs" is a slogan, something meant to enlist the citizens, a figure of speech?" T7 #32
a) Have I not already mentioned LBJ's "War on Poverty" to make that specific point? I believe I beat you to it.

b) Is it a slogan (or label)? ABSOLUTELY !! Does that exempt it from all further scrutiny / liability? OF COURSE NOT!!
If that were the case we could rob banks, under a slogan: "We're bank robbers! Stick 'em UP !!" and the law couldn't touch us!!

Therefore:

c) It doesn't matter what the %$#@ they CALL it. They can call it Gertrude for all I care.

- It is an ACTUAL War.

- The WOD is a War of martial oppression against the People of the United States.

- It's waged with paramilitary troops, toting guns, sometimes wearing masks, flack vests, and performing pre-dawn raids.

- They're taking us prisoner! Not just a few! So many of US are being held Prisoners of Drug War that the nation we memorialize in song as "the land of the free and the home of the brave" reportedly has the highest per capita incarceration rate in the Western world.

- They plunder our assets, including $cash not connected to any crime the one carrying it is connected with. (CBS-TV 60 Minutes has done several segments on this, including plunder at airports (where our rights to freedom from unwarranted searches are more widely disregarded), Highway 10 near Sulphur, Texas, etc.
And in this unbridled binge of Drug War plunder, it is not the government's burden to prove us guilty. Instead it the legal burden of the citizen to prove his innocence. And even then, there doesn't seem much compulsion for the government to return such plunder.
A client of mine, a lawyer lost his house to this. He'd built the house with his own hands. The government took it, and put it up for sale.
"I suspect you realize that the term "war on drugs" is a slogan, something meant to enlist the citizens, a figure of speech?" T7 #32
PLEASE don't be naïve.

The U.S. government's War against the People is one whole Hell of a lot more than a slogan. It is a human rights calamity.

NOTE:
I don't recall anything in the Constitution that authorizes age discrimination. If I was father of a 17 year old, I would not want that 17 year old smoking cigarettes.
BUT !!
I'm not aware of any enumeration in the Constitution which for example prohibiting the drivers licensure of 15 year olds.
 
"No one is levying war against the United States" G4 #23

"Congress is, according to the Constitution." s #26

"Based on what? Please be specific." G4 #34
a) Define "war".

b) ARTICLE 1. SECTION 8. 11 grants congress the authority to declare War.

BUT !!

ARTICLE 1. SECTION 8. 11 does not specify the specific details of how such declarations are to be structured and submitted.
So when congressmen vote on spending bills that FUND Drug War, they are by direct implication voting their approval of that Drug War.
If they disapprove it, they shouldn't fund it.
"Follow the $money." Mark ("deep throat") Felt
Let's be clear here.
This isn't some unfortunate skirmish, some localized miscarriage, such as Wounded Knee, or Ruby Ridge.

Drug War is a nation-wide martial usurpation of the Creator endowed, Constitutionally enumerated, unalienable right of Liberty.
And Drug War continues, even in Colorado, against cocaine, heroin, and nearly all the others.

The U.S. Drug War is not merely War, by any sensible dictionary definition. It is treason, it is War against the States / People.

And as is the tradition for such traitors caught in time of War, those party to Drug War, including any U.S. legislator that has voted to fund it* should be:
- arrested
- incarcerated
- tried
- convicted, and
- summarily executed, preferably by firing squad, up against a convenient exterior wall of the U.S. capitol.

Vermin should be exterminated. And I know of no more reliable way to insure there won't be a Drug War #3, than to kill them all, and to leave the bullet holes unrepaired, as an unsubtle reminder of the penalty for treason in time of War.

DEFEND OUR CONSTITUTION !!!
" Oddly enough we are giving military aid to the world's largest opium supplier (Afghanistan) when the enemy (Taliban?) was doing a lot to fight (shut down?) the opium trade. " t7 #39
This war is madness!
It's not that you are wrong.
It's that you are right. The U.S. has clearly chosen BOTH sides of the fence on this one.

* There is no statute of limitations on treason, that I know of.
 
I have long believed that the Constitution does not grant the Federal government authority to pass the drug laws it's been passing since the 1930's. They knew it lacked the authority when they banned alcohol in the '20's, which is why they had to pass a Constitutional amendment to do it. But to ban other substances, they (including SCOTUS) bastardized and exploited the tax and commerce powers. These interpretations/precedents need to be overturned.

And I have long believed that the "war on drugs", as currently being waged, is really just a "war on drug makers, sellers, and users" - which is a war on people, not drugs. A properly-waged war on drugs would focus on empowering and encouraging people to make wiser choices for themselves. Hit the enemy where it hurts - the desire to use them in the first place.

But the notion of it being treason is a new one to me.

It says levying war against the United States is treason, but does that include the United States levying war against a subset of the people? If so then it would seem Abraham Lincoln would be a traitor for waging war against the South. Am I wrong?
 
"A properly-waged war on drugs would focus on empowering and encouraging people to make wiser choices for themselves." BD #41
No no Mr. Smithers! You're beating your wife improperly.
I'll demonstrate for you the way to beat your wife correctly ...

Ironically, we see the contrast in efficacy between Drug War, and public information campaigns.
We broadcast PSAs against tobacco use, and per capita tobacco use is dropping.
We wage a War of martial oppression against marijuana, and such use continues.

It does raise the question:
is it curtailing use that's the true Drug War objective here? Or is it simply a self-righteous indulgence to punish, to exercise harsh punitive authority?

If it were the welfare of the People that was the true objective, wouldn't Drug War have already ended?
 
Regardless of it's legality we ought to have the sense to end the failed policy. The prohibition has done absolutely nothing to stop the availability or use of drugs in this country. You can buy and sell heroin in your neighborhood 24/7.

As a free people one should be free to poison ones self.
 
bf #43

I agree with your pragmatism argument.

BUT !!

I don't think it negates the legal argument.
 
This must mean that every Federal law and regulation is inapplicable.

The ban and regulation of explosive ordnance.

The ban and regulation of automatic weapons.

DOT regulations.

The list goes on.
 
a #45

Perhaps.

"... shall not be infringed" would seem to allow private citizen ownership and custody of WMD, including any doomsday weapon.

I know of no nuclear doomsday weapon, unless it's a bomb big enough to blast Earth into unsurvivable fragments.

But an extremely contagious bio-weapon that would kill everyone? Even a mad scramble by the world's best scientists sequestered in Level IV containment wouldn't be likely to find a vaccine in time to preserve a viable breeding population.

There are I imagine plenty of religious zealots that want their 40 virgins & a mule enough to extinguish the human race to get it.

Now isn't that just spacial!
 
a #45

Perhaps.

"... shall not be infringed" would seem to allow private citizen ownership and custody of WMD, including any doomsday weapon.

I know of no nuclear doomsday weapon, unless it's a bomb big enough to blast Earth into unsurvivable fragments.

But an extremely contagious bio-weapon that would kill everyone? Even a mad scramble by the world's best scientists sequestered in Level IV containment wouldn't be likely to find a vaccine in time to preserve a viable breeding population.

There are I imagine plenty of religious zealots that want their 40 virgins & a mule enough to extinguish the human race to get it.

Now isn't that just spacial!

It's your wacky logic, not mine.
 
"It's your wacky logic, not mine." a #47

False.

a) I has nothing to do with logic, and may or may not be logical at all.

b) It's not logic, it's grammar.

c) "Words mean things." Rush Limbaugh

d) According to the most standard conventions of accepted American English grammar "shall not be infringed" is unambiguously clear.

If you can cite an ambiguity in those 4 words, you're welcome to explain it. Otherwise, we should consider the matter conclusive.
 
Yep, especially where it concerns our foreign intervention. Oddly enough we are giving military aid to the world's largest opium supplier (Afghanistan) when the enemy (Taliban?) was doing a lot to fight (shut down?) the opium trade.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_production_in_Afghanistan

Yes, in April 2001 Colin Powell hand-carried a check to the Taliban, photo op and all. $43 million as I recall, for their cooperation in the war on drugs.

I forget how long it took post-invasion, but the CIA had things firmly under control once again. That is another behind the scenes reason for the invasion of Afghanistan. Colonialism knows no boundaries.
 
This must mean that every Federal law and regulation is inapplicable.

The ban and regulation of explosive ordnance.

The ban and regulation of automatic weapons.

DOT regulations.

The list goes on.

Not necessarily. We must judge on a case by case basis IMO. Regulations must be written and enforced in a wise manner.
 
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