What Are the Risks of Legalizing All Drugs?

[Ivan Seeking]

If you could change one law or one legal standard, what would it be? Law means the effect of a legal document setting forth rules governing a particular kind of activity, not physical laws

Not just one law but I would legalize all drugs; esp so as to eliminate prescriptions for medicine. Not to say that this would be a problem free solution by any means, but legal and illegal drugs are such rackets in so many ways that I see no other way to resolve essential problems in either case. Although they have always thought that I was way off target here, now that my parents are well into their seventies and medication is a big part of their lives, for practical reasons they now agree with me about prescription medicines.

Even famously conservative intellectuals such as William F Buckley http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F._Buckley have long supported this idea.

 

[aeroegnr]

I would repeal the 16th amendment

 

[dduardo]

I would eliminate all copyright and patent laws. Therefore I would repeal Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of the Constitution.

 

[Vega]

While for the most part I would agree with you, I also see some bad possibilities. If drugs that are currently prescription only were to become easy to buy, then you'd see more people trying to treat themselves rather than seeing a doctor. We already have a huge issue with antibiotic resistant diseases now, imagine how much worse that could get. The person who bought the drugs is not in that case the only person with a potential to be harmed and the potential instead is for epidemics that we can't treat effectively.

For currently illegal drugs, I agree completely. I always thought that was kind of silly to be trying so hard to protect people from themselves.