Close to two-thirds of American voters said that they support President Joe Biden’s move to pardon people with federal charges for simple possession of marijuana, according to POLITICO/Morning Consult poll results released this week.
Of these voters, 40% strongly approve of Biden’s decision, said the poll. An even higher percentage (69%) said they would support potentially changing marijuana’s classification under federal law.
According to an article from Ohio State University, marijuana – a term that refers to the dried leaves, flowers, stems, and seeds from Cannabis sativa plants, that contain the mind-altering chemical THC – was introduced to the U.S. by Mexican immigrants.
“That introduction, in turn, generated a reaction in the U.S., tinged perhaps with anti-Mexican xenophobia,” the article explained.
Federal regulation attempts related to marijuana began in 1906 with Pure Food and Drug Act and continued with steps such as the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act and the 1970 Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act. The last put marijuana in the most restrictive category of drugs in the U.S., where it remains today.
“Consider that marijuana remains on the federal government’s list of Schedule I drugs, defined as the most dangerous of the controlled substances, and is labeled as posing a severe risk of addiction, although many physicians don’t believe that to be true,” said Ohio State University’s article.
States have also passed their own marijuana legislation. In the 1990s, states began passing legislation allowing medical and recreational marijuana use.
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In recent years, support of marijuana use has reached record levels. According to a November 2021 Gallup poll, 68% of Americans supported legalizing marijuana, on par with a record high from 2020. Earlier this year, another Gallup poll found that around 16% of Americans said they currently smoke marijuana, and 48% said they had tried it at some point in their lifetime.
That poll found that Americans’ regular use of marijuana was “modestly higher than cigarettes” and was trending upwards.
According to the POLITICO/Morning Consult poll, 71% of Millennials supported Biden’s cannabis pardons and 68 percent support the process to review cannabis’ federal drug status.
“About 800,000 Americans are arrested annually for marijuana offenses, mostly simple possession,” said the Ohio State University article. In 2012, the American Civil Liberties Union reported that economists estimated that ending marijuana prohibition would save the U.S. $7.7 billion per year in government expenditure on enforcement.
“Sending people to prison for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit,” said Biden when he announced his pardons. “Criminal records for marijuana possession have also imposed needless barriers to employment, housing, and educational opportunities.”
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