A majority of Americans support marijuana legalization according to a recent Gallop poll.
This is a clear indication that Americans are fed up with our failed drug policies that over the past 40 years have devastated families and communities and come to include an all-out war on marijuana. Marijuana arrests now account for over half of all drug arrests in the United States. Of the 8.2 million marijuana arrests between 2001 and 2010, 88% were for simply having marijuana. And despite roughly equal usage rates, blacks are 3.73 times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana. This aggressive enforcement of marijuana possession laws has needlessly ensnared hundreds of thousands of people into the criminal justice system and wastes billions of our taxpayers’ dollars.
Voters in Portland will have a chance to take the first step toward ending these failed policies on November 5, by voting yes on Question 1 to legalize the use of marijuana by adults 21 and over within city limits.