NationStates Jolt Archive

I've always wondered - under what authority did the US government ban the use, sale, transportation, etc. of the various and sundry illegal drugs by statute? I ask this because Prohibition, the ban on alcohol, required a Constitutional amendment. Why didn't the 'prohibition' of cocaine, marijuana, heroine, LSD, etc. require a Constitutional amendment?

I guess because under the constitution people were free to drink and sell drink under certain licenses and that needed change but with drugs there was an ammendment needed.

Nixon very craftily helped shape the Controlled Substances Act, circumventing the need for a Constitutional Amendment.

Start be reading the source:

http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/agency/csa.htm

Thanks, NG, but, not to be lazy, that's massive. I've read the abstract, but there's no way I can read the entire thing right now. Not to mention, I doubt there's a 'this is how we're circumventing the Constitution' section. Is there any chance I can get some specifics as to why an amendment wasn't necessary?

it was tax based. They raised a tax and required a license to sell drugs, and just didn't give out permits, effectively banning them without needing to change the constitution. I don't really understand todays logic of having a full out ban (as I understand it to be) when the constitution hasn't changed

Ahhhh. Clever. Underhanded way of doing things, though.

I personally think that most currently illegal drugs should be made legal - I'm against the highly expensive and ultimately detrimental and pointless War on Drugs.

The argument in the law itself goes along the lines of

"(3) A major portion of the traffic in controlled substances flows through interstate and foreign commerce. Incidents of the traffic which are not an integral part of the interstate or foreign flow, such as manufacture, local distribution, and possession, nonetheless have a substantial and direct effect upon interstate commerce because--

(A) after manufacture, many controlled substances are transported in interstate commerce,
(B) controlled substances distributed locally usually have been transported in interstate commerce immediately before their distribution, and
(C) controlled substances possessed commonly flow through interstate commerce immediately prior to such possession.

4) Local distribution and possession of controlled substances contribute to swelling the interstate traffic in such substances.


(5) Controlled substances manufactured and distributed intrastate cannot be differentiated from controlled substances manufactured and distributed interstate. Thus, it is not feasible to distinguish, in terms of controls, between controlled substances manufactured and distributed interstate and controlled substances manufactured and distributed intrastate.


(6) Federal control of the intrastate incidents of the traffic in controlled substances is essential to the effective control of the interstate incidents of such traffic.


(7) The United States is a party to the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, and other international conventions designed to establish effective control over international and domestic traffic in controlled substances. "


A rather loose reading of the interstate commerce clause, apparently.

The above is different from the tax-stamp reasoning which was the basis for the original machine-gun ban and which has been modified for use in gun control today.

The simplest example of tax-stamp federal control is the federal regulation of gun silencers, which are legal under the federal gun control regime so long as a 200$ tax is paid and subject to a background check.

States are free to outlaw gun silencers, but if you live (as I do) in a state where they are legal, they can be legally acquired by filing certain paperwork, having a magistrate or head of police sign an affadavit confirming you are not a criminal and the payment of a 200$ tax per silencer.

Originally (tommy-gun era) the government used the same system for machine guns but then refused to issue tax stamps. The courts ruled this unlawful.

No ammount of paperwork and no tax makes it legal to posess things like schedual one controlled substances.