—FOREWORD—
My
first foreword for this book was written in 1985. A lot of time has passed
since then, but some things have remained constant. In 1985 I wrote of 600,000
pot arrests nationwide. Last year, in 1997, there were still 642,000 new arrests
for marijuana-related offenses. At least 75% of those cases involved marijuana
possessed or grown for personal consumption.
Thirteen
years have brought some changes, of course. Today’s sentencing laws are
even more severe than they were in 1985. More people are losing their homes
for marijuana offenses than they were in 1985. As a result of the “war
on drugs”, prison-building—not schools—has become the hot new
growth industry, and the protections of the Fourth Amendment are becoming
a find, but increasingly vague, memory.
Another
disturbing change has been the heightening—if that is imaginable—of
the level of government hypocrisy. Public proclamations to the contrary notwithstanding,
no one today can seriously believe the war on drugs is any more winnable than
was the war in Vietnam. No one now can seriously doubt the benefits of a permanent
cease-fire in this insane drug war.
Nonetheless,
the war wages on. Our medical knowledge alone puts the therapeutic value of
marijuana beyond question, yet people are still being prosecuted for their
purely medical use of cannabis. The government says: “Maybe so, but we’re
sending a message.” Then those 642,000 people were casualties in a war
that has only a symbolic rationale? Seems like an awful waste.
I
look at my comments of thirteen years ago with a certain amazement that the
words are still accurate. Quite disappointing, actually. I had hoped we could
have put the issue to rest and that, by now, Jack’s book would have become
an historical curiosity. No, the book today is as timely as ever, and the
Emperor still quite naked.
—Michael E. Rose
Attorney at Law / Portland, Oregon
May 13, 1998
electricemperor.com
