Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

March 6, 2009

In a recent interview with CNN Arizona state attorney general Terry Goddard became the first public official of note to suggest that that legalizing marijuana might relieve some of the violence that is tearing Mexico apart and threatening to spill over our southern border.

Prohibition acts as a price support program for the product being prohibited. Once legal sales of the product are permitted, the so-called ?risk premium? is removed and competition forces down the price. If marijuana were sold legally like tobacco, the market wouldn?t be dominated by criminal syndicates engaged in lethal competition for pre-eminence in a black market.

Unfortunately, Goddard coupled his suggestion with an oblique endorsement of an even deadlier form or prohibition commonly called gun control. He blames the armed violence of the cartels on the accessibility of firearms from the United States.

Nothing worthwhile will be gained if we simply swap drug prohibition for civilian disarmament.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.