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"Drugs,"
a broad and vague term, usually refers to mind-altering chemicals
that people ingest. But this covers a wide range, including
medical prescriptions, legal stimulants (e.g. caffeine
and tobacco), legal intoxicants (alcohol), and illegal
intoxicants. Attitudes toward drugs are similarly
variable. Wine is seen as both a religious sacrament
and an unacceptable temptation; juvenile smoking can
be seen as a premature imitation of adult behavior or
as rebellion.
Many
currently legal drugs were banned when first introduced in various
countries but the bans proved unenforceable. Consumers eventually
have come to use less powerful (and more manageable) forms of
tobacco, coffee, and alcohol. In the U.S., drugs of all kinds
(including opiates) were legal and widely available until the
20th century, especially before the Harrison Narcotic Act of
1914. Prohibition of alcohol (1920 - 1933) was a failed "Noble
Experiment," with highly contested effects on lawlessness,
health, and patterns of alcohol consumption. Prohibition
also is a major source of lessons for later problems with illegal
drugs.
Marijuana,
a member of the hemp family, has been grown as a source
of fiber, and used as a medicine or intoxicant, since antiquity.
Anti-marijuana sentiment, and the belief that marijuana causes
criminal behavior, led to the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act.
The
1970 Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention & Control Act (a.k.a.
the Controlled Substances Act) established a systematic and
consolidated U.S. drug code, ranking drugs in five classes according
to their potential for abuse, medical usefulness , and
safety. Drugs also can be pharmacologically classified
as stimulants, depressants, narcotics , or hallucinogens.
Many
people argue that drugs should be much more broadly legalized,
with their use (and consequences) left to individual conscience
and responsibility. But the consequences for health, lawlessness,
and patterns of drug use are as highly disputed as they were
for Prohibition. Much depends on whether the law is understood
to be a description of ideal behavior or a minimal
standard of conduct; whether law should protect people
from themselves; and to what degree drug-taking causes
or encourages criminal behavior.
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