We have had occasion previously to draw comparisons between the use patterns and effects of marijuana and those of our society's other major recreational intoxicant—alcohol. It will repay us in this chapter to compare these two drugs somewhat more systematically. In doing so, it will become clear that the position of alcohol in our society exerts a very strong influence upon the costs and benefits of the marijuana laws.

In comparing alcohol and marijuana we will begin by focusing on four major areas of concern: the criminogenic effects of the two drugs, the physical damage that they cause to their users, their relative dangers as inducers of mental illness or other psychological harm, and their effects on automobile driving.

At the outset, however, it must be emphasized that the grim picture of the effects of alcohol presented here is by no means a complete picture of alcohol use in this country. We are here focusing only on alcohol abuse—that is, the use of this drug in such a manner that it interferes with the health of the user or his adjustment in society.

Most users of alcohol, however, use it in moderation. They, of course, do not commit crimes under its influence, nor, so far as we can tell, do they damage themselves physically or mentally. And among alcohol-users, drunken driving is still very much the exception. Not only is alcohol not seriously harmful for the great majority of its users, but it has positive values for them in terms of relaxation and lessening of anxiety.

Despite this, however, the comparison between alcohol and marijuana abuse is still appropriate. There is no indication that the ordinary user of marijuana feels his drug to have fewer positive values than does the normal social user of alcohol. Both Prohibition and the criminalization of marijuana are justified on the basis of drug abuse, not use. The fact is that neither marijuana nor alcohol is used abusively by the great majority of its users, and the evidence indicates that marijuana has certainly no greater a proportion of abusers than alcohol.

The Criminogenic Effects

With respect to the first of our comparisons, the criminogenic effects of the two drugs, we have already discussed in Chapter IV the relationship between marijuana and crime. Prob-ably the most accurate short summary of this would be to say that the use of marijuana does not appear to increase violent crime. There may well be a small number of individuals in whom the drug might sufficiently lower inhibitions against violence or precipitate a psychotic reaction with resulting aggression. This number, however, is probably more than balanced by the much larger number who are either tranquilized by the drug or rendered less violent by the social role appropriate to the drug's use.

And while in non-Western nations there have been reports of a connection between marijuana use and crimes against property—often committed to support a drug habit—there has been no such allegation in the United States, because we are so much more wealthy, because the marijuana-users here are comparatively so much better integrated, or because some other differentiating factor makes the foreign reports, if correct, inapplicable.

On the other hand, we have an enormous literature concluding that alcohol has a strongly criminogenic effect under a wide range of conditions. As in the case of marijuana, however, the methodological problems in reaching such a conclusion are severe.

To conclude that the use of alcohol has caused the commission of a violent crime, we must know that the crime would not have occurred but for the alcohol drinking. This is difficult to substantiate for several reasons. First of all, alcohol use is never the sole cause of an outbreak of violence. There must, of course, be other factors, such as the user's personality and the social setting, with which the drug interacts. These interactions are generally so complex that it is usually impossible to say reliably that any particular crime would or would not have happened if the perpetrator had not been drinking.

Moreover, there are additional methodological difficulties in the large number of studies that show a very high rate of violent criminality among those either under the influence of alcohol or suffering from the chronic effects of alcohol consumption. The problem is that such studies do not remove the possibility that the alcohol use, rather than causing violence, is caused by the same condition of personal instability that results in violence.

Thus, it is undeniable that violent people drink more than less violent people. It is true that their drinking may be a cause of their violence; but, on' the other hand, the use of alcohol may also be an effort—not completely successful—to ward off that violence. In addition, studies showing that a high percentage of those who commit crimes are under the influence of alcohol have the further difficulty that they provide no base line from which we can measure; that is, we do not know the number of similar people, in terms of psychological disposition, socioeconomic status, and the like, who were drunk at the time but did not commit a crime.

Despite all of these methodological problems, it would be a great error to conclude that alcohol is no more likely to produce crime than is marijuana. Quite the contrary, the disagreement on fundamental conclusions regarding marijuana and crime has no counterpart in the alcohol area, where there is almost universal agreement that that drug plays an enormous role in a wide range of criminal behavior.

It is likely that this agreement is a consequence of a host of factors. First of all, our culture is completely familiar with the effects of alcohol. A high percentage of Americans have committed aggressive acts—though not, of course, necessarily crimes—under the influence of alcohol, and they "know" that they would not have behaved that way but for the use of alcohol.

Moreover, we maintain stereotypes—of the drunk who feels he can lick any man in the house, the barroom brawl, and the drunken fight. These stereotypes are considerably more probative than the picture of the violent, dope-crazed marijuana-user. While the marijuana stereotypes are not shared by the users of that drug, the alcohol stereotypes are to one degree or another accepted by alcohol-users. As such they not only provide information on the effects of the drug, but, equally important, they influence the social role considered appropriate to the drug's use—a crucial, variable in determining the effects of drugs.

Finally, entirely apart from the set and setting of the different drug-users, there is a more persuasive pharmocological explanation for an increase in violence under the influence of alcohol. The lowering of inhibitions caused by alcohol is not accompanied by a lowering of aggression and an increase in passivity, as is the case with marijuana.

In any event, criminologists have not been content with such nonquantitative reasoning. They have attempted to measure sta-tistically the influence of alcohol upon violence. And though the methodological problems already mentioned weaken the thrust of these figures, the very magnitude of the effect they show is power-ful evidence of a strong connection between alcohol and violent crime.

For instance, a number of studies have come up with impressive figures relating to homicide, in particular. According to the 1967 Task Force Report: Drunkenness of the President's Com-mission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice,

Homicide ... is an alcohol-related crime.... Shupe (1954) in an Ohio study found 43 percent of the homicide offenders had been drinking. Spain et al. (1951) found 87 percent of a small sample of homicide offenders had been drinking. The most comprehensive study of homicides is that by Wolfgang (1958; see also Wolfgang and Strohm, 1956). Among 588 Philadelphia cases alcohol was absent from both victim and offender in only 36 percent of the cases. In 9 percent of the cases alcohol was present in the victim only; in 11 percent of the cases it was present in the offender only. In 44 percent of the cases it was present in both the victim and offender. Consequently in 64 percent of the homicide cases alcohol was a factor; and in the majority of these alcohol was present in both parties to the crime.'

Alcohol has not only been implicated in general homicide statistics, but in the type of murder weapon as well. A study by Professor Marvin E. Wolfgang furnishes valuable data on this subject. On the basis of an analysis of every criminal homicide in Philadelphia for the years 1948-52, some 588 cases, Wolfgang concluded that

There is a significant association between alcohol in the homicide situation and the method of inflicting death. More stabbings oc-curred with alcohol present during the act of homicide than did any other assault method. Of 228 stabbings, 72 percent involved the presence of alcohol. Beating by fist, feet or blunt instrument ranked second, for of 128 cases 69 percent revealed alcohol in the situation. The 194 shootings and 38 slayings by miscellaneous methods yielded no association with alcohol, for only 55 percent of the former and 45 percent of the latter involved the presence of alcohol.2

Although Professor Wolfgang is careful to caution against construing the relationships he reports as causal connections, sug-gesting that "significant relationships only point a finger of infer-ence at the presence of alcohol as a cause,"3 in a more recent publication he suggests mechanisms that are at least consistent with a causal hypothesis. He states, for example, that

In considering the distribution of passionate murders, it should also be remembered that alcohol functions to release emotions and lower cortical control over manifestations of anger.4

In another passage, he reports that

Alcoholism, whenever it reaches chronic pathological levels, can cause homicide through its violent motor outbursts or through its persecutory or jealousy delusional components.5

If alcohol acts to release impulses and lower inhibitions that restrain individuals from aggressive behavior, it would be peculiar if such behavior manifested itself only in homicidal crime. Of course, this is not the case. Between March and October of 1959, a total of 2,324 new inmates in California's state penitentiaries were interviewed!' Of these, twenty-nine percent had been intoxicated at the time of their arrest. Even more significant for present purposes is the fact that over sixty percent of those involved in crimes of great personal risk (aggravated assault, sex crimes, etc.) had been drinking prior to the commission of the crime.

Another study, conducted by L. M. Shupe, a chemist associated with the Columbus (Ohio) Police Department,7 also supports such a view. This study reports the urine alcohol concentration of 882 persons arrested either during or immediately following the commission of a felony. Only twenty-seven percent showed no alcohol whatever (compared to seventeen percent for those arrested for the thirty homicide offenses in the sample). Moreover, Shupe found that alcohol was present more often in crimes of violence and less often in offenses against property requiring a higher level of skill (e.g., ninety-two percent of the "cuttings" and concealed weapons arrests versus sixty percent of the forgery arrests). While this research is by no means conclusive, it is nevertheless highly suggestive, the more so in that the results are typical of a large number of studies.8

Research has also been done on the relationship of alcohol to sexual offenses. In a study published in 1940,9 Selling examined one hundred male sex offenders, of whom eight percent were chronic alcoholics and of whom thirty-five percent had been drinking at the time of the offense. And while the fact that almost every member of this thirty-five percent blamed his crime upon alcohol is not any more probative than are similar efforts with respect to marijuana, the fact that more than one-third of the offenders committed their offenses while intoxicated remains impressive. Similar results were obtained in England by Cruz: in a study of sexual delinquents, almost half were described as "constant" drinkers, and nearly one-fifth were drunk at the time of their offense.10

Finally, there is abundant evidence that it is not merely that the alcohol-user tends to be more often arrested or prosecuted than the similar offender who does not use alcohol. Thus in the student culture, where prosecution for all sorts of criminal and quasi-criminal activity is rare, the alcohol-induced offense is extremely common. As stated by Dr. Roswell D. Johnson, director of Health Services for Brown University and Pembroke College,

Last year I talked to the Eastern Association of University and College Housing Authorities and asked for a show of hands as far as destruction of college property was concerned that could be traced to alcohol and then to other drugs. As far as the other drugs were concerned, only three hands in this large group were raised. But when it came to alcohol, every hand went up, and those with a wry sense of humor put up both hands.11

In addition to the more dramatic violence, sex offenses, and the like, which are caused by alcohol, there is an entirely different category of offense which not only is more obviously related to the abuse of alcohol, but which exerts an even more serious drain on law-enforcement resources. In this category fall such offenses as public intoxication, as well as a high percentage of disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, vagrancy, and similar catchall offenses that "are commonly known to refer largely, and sometimes entirely, to public drunkenness."12

In discussing the place of such offenses in the overall pattern of crime in the United States, Dr. Richard Blum, writing in the Task Force Report: Drunkenness of the President's Commission, made the following observations:

Given present reporting systems . . . it is obviously not possible to know exactly how many arrests for drunkenness or alcohol control offenses occur in the United States in any one year, nor is it possible to know how many different persons out of all those arrested were involved in an alcohol use offense. Nevertheless, present statistics do provide good estimates of the magnitude of alcohol use offenses as a proportion of all reported offenses. For example, in 1961 (FBI, "Uniform Crime Reports") 55 percent of all arrests in the United States reported to and by the FBI were for alcohol-related offenses—drunkenness, liquor law violation and drunk driving—or for offenses which often involve drink-ing—disorderly conduct and vagrancy. In 1963 the proportion out of total offenses was the same (55.2 percent), and in 1965 the proportion was 52.6 percent. There can be no question that the burden of alcohol use offenses is a grave one in terms of frequency of arrest, constituting, as it does, the majority of all reported in the United States.13

Even these striking figures do not present a complete picture of the amount of police work devoted to alcohol-related problems of this nature. According to the President's Commission,

The approximately 2 million arrests annually in the United States for public intoxication do not completely represent police involve-ment with this problem. Police officers in many communities use informal means of handling drunken individuals--in suburban communities they may escort the inebriated individual home, or telephone a taxicab to perform the same function, and in still others they may warn the individual about his behavior and ask his friends to escort him home. In other communities, drunks arrested may be held until sober or released without charge.14

In the face of the research data linking alcohol with a large range of serious as well as expensive crime, it would be absurd to contend that, if marijuana were "only" as productive ;i:If crime as alcohol, its use should be legalized simply for the sake of symmetry. In view of Chapter IV, however, this is not the issue. Since marijuana is not criminogenic, the argument does not go simply to the issue of symmetry. Rather, it questions the basic rationality of a legal system that exerts whatever force It can muster to encourage marijuana-users to switch to alcohol.

Physical Harm to the User

Having briefly considered the respective criminogenic effects of alcohol and marijuana, we move on to compare the types of physical harm they may cause to their users. Here the bal-ance is, if anything, even more one-sidedly against alcohol.

It is almost unanimously agreed by all those who have dis-cussed the issue that marijuana use, even in excess, does little or no physical harm to the user. It may cause a reddening of the eyes, perhaps occasional bronchitis in a heavy user, and even perhaps the same type of damage that can occur from use of tobacco-- remembering, of course, that, although a heavy marijuana-user will hold each puff in his lungs for some while, he will smoke perhaps two cigarettes a day, while a heavy tobacco-user will smoke between forty and sixty cigarettes in the same period.

With respect to alcohol, however, a considerably less benign picture appears. Indeed, it is most interesting to compare the following factual view of alcohol with the overblown horror stories concerning the effects of marijuana.

In discussing the physical effects of alcohol on its users, it is helpful to distinguish the effects of acute intoxication from those of chronic abuse. In terms of lasting physical damage, the latter effects are by far the more serious, but before examining the problems associated with chronic alcoholism, a few words on alcohol's acute effects are perhaps in order.

Probably the major physical danger of acute alcohol intoxica-tion is harm resulting from an accident or a fight. Even aside from the problem of automobile accidents, which we will discuss separately, injuries from falls, fights (where typically both victim and assailant are under the influence of alcohol), choking on meat (alcohol intoxication inhibits the swallowing and coughing-up re-flexes), and a host of other causes are not uncommon effects of drunkenness.

Aside from the possibility of traumatic injury—a possibility that depends more on the conditions and settings in which alcohol is used than on any pharmacological effect of the drug—it is a matter of common observation that isolated episodes of drunkenness need not and ordinarily do not result in lasting physical damage to an individual. Most authorities believe that the physical effects of alcohol in such encounters are transitory and reversible, with the exception, of course, of those rare cases where, as part of a fraternity initiation or the like, someone drinks enough to kill himself.

On the other hand, acute intoxication occasionally results in more than mere drunkenness. One quite dramatic, though relatively uncommon, complication is a condition known as "alcoholic epilepsy," in which a nonepileptic individual who may have drunk only a moderate amount of alcohol experiences a grand-mal convulsive seizure.15

Turning now to the physical damage concomitant with chronic alcohol abuse, it is important to mention at the outset that many of the problems in this area are connected with vitamin deficiencies as well as with the toxicity of the drug itself. Sometimes complications of alcoholism occur simply because the calories in alcohol make it unnecessary for the alcoholic to eat enough.

There are, however, other important nutritional consequences of long-term heavy alcohol use. First, alcoholism is often accompanied by morning nausea, which leads to bypassing breakfast. Though alcoholic consumption during the day makes up for the loss of calories, the price is usually an inflamed stomach (gastritis) or, in the extreme, a diseased liver (cirrhosis), which in turn causes greater loss of appetite. In addition, even when he has an appetite, the alcoholic often eats poorly. Wine or whiskey may consume all his income, especially if he cannot hold a job, and the breakage of his family may force him to cook his own meals. In either case, his diet will be starchy and deficient in protein and the B vitamins.16

The exact role of nutritional problems in the physical conse-quences of alcoholism is not yet understood. Thus, although it is clear that chronic alcoholism is the primary cause of liver disease, the mechanism of this has not yet been proven. It is possible that the liver cells are simply starved of nutrients; that the liVer is in-jured by the excess of the fatty acids that alcohol causes to be re-leased into the bloodstream; that alcohol has a direct toxic effect upon the liver cells; or that some combination of these mechanisms is responsible. What does seem certain, however, is that an alco-holic's mild liver ailment may become irreversible due to cirrhosis of the liver, the scarring and hardening of the liver, which kills about half of its sufferers.

Another of the most common of the effects of chronic alcohol overuse, peripheral neuritis, does seem to be caused, at least in part, by a vitamin shortage. At first, a lack of vitamin B causes the long nerves reaching to the end of the limbs to tingle and then to become numb. As the patient worsens, nerves responsible for muscular movement are affected. The long-term drinker's vision may also be seriously impaired, as it has long been known that the optic nerve is particularly sensitive to alcohol's effects; indeed, "changes in this nerve and the coverings have been observed in as high as 17 percent of the verified cases of chronic alcoholism.17 Often the alcoholic's sense of touch, his coordination, and his strength vanish. If he is confined to bed and treated with vitamin B the symptoms may remit, but not infrequently permanent dam-age has already been done.18

One could continue at some length to discuss the debilitative physical manifestations of chronic alcoholism. For the purposes of comparison with marijuana, however, we have done more than enough. Accordingly we will move on to an area of major controversy—a comparison of the mental damage caused by the two drugs.

Mental Damage

We have already discussed in Chapter V the psychiatric dangers of marijuana use. To summarize, the acute dangers are for the most part limited to two in number. First is the toxic psychosis, a temporary disturbance of brain function due to a foreign substance in the bloodstream; and second is the genuine psychosis that persists after the active ingredients of marijuana are no longer in the bloodstream. The first of these reactions is fairly common, especially in cases of marijuana overdose, but it is not very serious. The second, which can result in mental hospitalization, is typically caused by panic and, though of course quite serious, is extremely rare today.

The mental harm caused by chronic marijuana use raises considerably more complex issues. Marijuana sometimes produces dependency, and since the drug is an intoxicant, this dependency often interferes with the performance of productive work ot with studies. More worrisome, probably, is the fact that the chronic effects of marijuana, in terms of long-term mental damage, are not known. It is certainly possible that there are such effects, especially from heavy use over a long period. This has not been verified, however, and more important, the information we do have indicates 'that under American conditions whatever mental damage is due to marijuana either is not very gross or, if gross, does not effect a very large portion even of the comparatively heavy marijuana-users.

With respect to the mental effects of alcohol, the picture is far more clear. So far as the acute dangers are concerned, they roughly parallel those of marijuana. The toxic psychosis is one with which we are very familiar. We call it a good drunk. And though alcohol is so familiar in our culture that its use leads to almost no panic reactions, there is an acute alcoholic psychosis that, though rare, is about as frequent as that due to marijuana. It consists, in certain predisposed individuals, of the release of psychotic tendencies resulting in behavior characterized by delirium, hallucination, and aggressive outbursts. Finally, though this is as yet unconfirmed, a recently delivered paper has reported that each episode of drunkenness causes the destruction of some ten thousand brain cells.19

With respect to the chronic mental dangers of alcohol, the first thing that strikes one's attention is the sheer numbers of the sufferers. Not only do we have massive numbers of "problem drinkers," whose alcohol consumption has on occasion adversely affected their family and employment relations, but approximately seven percent of our drinkers are alcoholics who have "lost control over their alcohol intake in the sense that they are consistently unable to refrain from drinking or to stop drinking before getting intoxicated.20 Twenty-two percent of the first admissions of male patients to the nearly three hundred state mental hospitals in the United States were diagnosed as alcoholics, and the same percentage seems to hold for the psychiatric wards of general hospitals.21

The mental symptoms of chronic alcoholism are in part attributable to the fact that alcohol can be genuinely addicting, and as a result, withdrawal from the drug can be serious. Withdrawal symptoms occur when the heavy drinker suddenly stops imbibing alcohol or when he can no longer take in as much as his body has come to need. The earliest and most common withdrawal state is acute tremulousness (commonly known as the "shakes"). This condition may come so suddenly that it presents itself before drinking has been discontinued. The symptoms are severe shaking of the hands, anxiety, physical restlessness, and a feeling of weakness. About one-fourth of such sufferers have short hallucinations, visual or auditory.22

Delirium tremens occurs later, usually two to five days after the curtailment of drinking. Extreme fear, agitation, and great distractibility characterize the D.T.'s, although disorientation and hallucinations are the most vivid symptoms. In general, the alcoholic's mental condition at this time is one of chaos. The magnitude of the symptoms is so great that the patient usually requires hospitalization. Not uncommonly, when delirium tremens is ending, an amnestic syndrome may develop. This is a selective memory loss: recent events are quickly forgotten, and the patient remembers only distant happenings. In such cases, he may unconsciously invent circumstances to fill in the gaps.

More important than the effects of addiction, however, are the mental consequences of the same factors that cause the physical damage attributable to alcohol: vitamin deficiency and destruction through toxicity of nerve cells in the brain.

The permanent brain damage resulting from the destruction of brain cells may manifest itself in a number of forms. One com-mon form is alcoholic dementia, in which atrophy of cortical cells causes a decline in intelligence:

The patient gives clinical evidence . . . of advanced intellectual deterioration, being ultimately reduced to a vegetative state if not cut off by some intercurrent disease.23

Other relatively common forms, described as alcoholic psy-choses in the medical literature, are Korsakoff's syndrome and alcoholic pellagra, both of which appear to be attributable in part to niacin deficiencies. Wernicke's encephalopathy is another disorder arising from alterations in the nerve cells and is often associated with memory loss. Here the patient has great difficulty in concentrating, his mental responses become very slow, certain eyeball movements are paralyzed, and he experiences marked impairment of balance and gait.24

Although controversy surrounds the question of whether alco-holism is the cause or merely the first symptom of the "alcoholic psychoses," there is no question that certain recognizable patterns recur among alcoholics. One such pattern is the occurrence of pathological jealousy, most often in the male spouse, so that the alcoholic develops a sudden feeling of extreme suspicion of his spouse's fidelity. The condition is usually irreversible once delusions occur, though some forms of this disease disappear when drinking is stopped. Another pattern of alcoholic psychosis involves long-term auditory hallucinations. Characteristically, the patient hears voices talking about him in obscene language. The condition can continue for years, even after drinking is discontinued. These hallucinations differ markedly from the sudden, transient, and disorganized hallucinations seen or heard by the sufferer of acute tremulousness or delirium tremens.25

In addition to the effects on the brain of alcohol itself, it is noteworthy that the drug apparently plays a role in aggravating certain independent disorders. The presence of alcohol seems to prolong the effects of cerebral concussion or cerebral hemorrhaging,26 and it reinforces the action of other toxic substances in the body.27 Perhaps the most striking effect of alcohol in accentuating deteriorative processes is the phenomenon of premature aging.

The influence of chronic alcoholism on the aging process in general is obvious even to the novice. The sotted appearance of the in-dividual, the premature graying of the hair, the lack of tissue turgor as well as the attendant evidence of malnutrition, all testify only too clearly to the truth of this dictum. As for the brain, the evidence of premature atrophy also indicates the influence of alcohol in hastening the regressive alterations in the parenchyma of the brain. In fact, so similar are these changes in cases of chronic alcoholism as compared with those of advancing age that they cannot be clearly distinguished either grossly or micro-scopically.28

This brief discussion of the chronic mental effects of alcohol abuse could be considerably prolonged—albeit at the cost of bear-ing too close a resemblance to a temperance tract. We have set out enough, however, to destroy one very common answer to the often-asked question concerning the comparative dangers of alcohol and marijuana. It will not do to state that one cannot tell because the long-run mental dangers of marijuana use are as yet unknown.

First of all, as pointed out in Chapter V, they are not that unknown, at least in the great majority of cases. Nor can the issue be evaded with the common explanation that since the respective dangers of marijuana and alcohol are different, they are incommensurable and cannot be weighed against each other. The problem is that, even assuming the physical dangers of alcoholism cannot be weighed against the mental dangers of marijuana—on examination, a dubious point—the mental dangers of alcohol are enough. They are so serious in such a comparatively large percentage of users that even resolving every legitimate doubt left open by the evidence against marijuana both as to the seriousness of its effects and as to the percentage of its users injured, the balance could not possibly favor alcohol.

The Problem of Automobile Driving

The final area of comparison between marijuana and alcohol involves the effects of the two drugs upon the automobile driver. This is a fairly complex matter because it is generally assumed that the marijuana- and the alcohol-intoxicated drivers are equally dangerous. The difference between the two drugs that is alleged to justify their unequal treatment is that there presently is no test through which one suspected of driving under the influence of marijuana can be detected, whereas we have two reasonably accurate tests—a breathalyzer and blood test—to determine the presence of alcohol.

As stated by Irving Lang, chief counsel of the New York State Narcotic Addiction Control Commission:

A person driving under the influence of marijuana is as dangerous as a person driving under the influence of alcohol. How can society deter driving under the influence of marijuana? We can, of course, impose the same form of deterrent as we did with alcohol, that is, making it a criminal offense to drive under its influence. Theoretically, however, the law does not do vain and foolish things. Unenforceable statutes should not be passed. With respect to alcohol, it is relatively easy to prove that a person was driving under its influence. Smelling of alcohol on the breath, visual observation, blood alcohol tests or breath tests, make suc-ceksful prosecutions possible. The same cannot be said for mari-juana. Proof of driving while under the influence of marijuana would be a virtual impossibility. Accordingly it may properly be argued that a measured response is possible in connection with alcohol but if such a limited response is not possible with respect to marijuana at the present time, society has the right to ban its possession for all purposes.29

Many things can be said about this argument. Probably the most obvious is that it is clearly an afterthought. This argument was never listed among the reasons for the criminalization of mari-juana until quite recently, when examination began disclosing the weakness of the other arguments for that policy. Moreover, the very penalties we attach to marijuana offenses show that the driving problem is not the real reason for marijuana criminalization. Almost universally, mere possession of marijuana, with no indication that it has been used by someone who might drive a car when intoxicated, is punishable considerably more severely than is the actual offense of drunken driving. Finally, this argument is never used as a reason for the criminalization of other drugs, such as the tranquilizers and the antihistamines, which seem as danger-ous for the driver and, in practice, as hard to test for as marijuana.

Examining the argument on its merits, moreover, we should note that it involves a situation where the deterrent effect of the criminal law is at a minimum. The "drunk driving" laws attempt to deter those who are the least deterrable—those under the influence of a drug that lessens inhibitions. It is hard to see what extra measure of deterrence the law can provide when the likeli-hood of far more severe penalties such as maiming and death are so greatly increased by intoxicated driving. Certainly, most people would regard an arrest and even a conviction for drunken driving as a secondary hazard of that activity, considerably less significant than the increased likelihood of a serious accident.

On the other hand, it is at least possible that the laws against drunken driving are of some deterrent value and that- at least some people are deterred by the law from driving while drunk who, perhaps because of an exaggerated idea of their driving abilities or for some other reason, might otherwise chance it. If, as Mr. Lang states, the marijuana-intoxicated driver is not subject to this restraint, there is, at least on the surface, a reason for differential treatment of the two drugs.

We must, therefore, look more closely at the problem of automobile driving. Before doing so, however, it should be pointed out that we know considerably more about the effects of either alcohol or marijuana than we do about the abilities necessary to drive an automobile safely. Despite the problems of set and setting, laboratory experimentation can give us a great number of indications as to the effects of drugs. Until very recently, however, we did not have any method of testing driving other than the old method of driving along with someone—a method very difficult to analyze statistically and unsafe in the situations that are of most interest.

Moreover, although this problem is beginning to be solved through the use of computer-graded driver simulators, the difficulties are enormous. We still do not know much about what causes particular drivers to have accidents. Even the worst and most dangerous drivers do not have accidents most of the time they are driving. An accident, it appears, is the result of many factors, only one of which is a bad driver. And the bad driver may be a very good driver most of the time. As a result, tests run under laboratory settings may reveal the driver who often does things wrong—even though somehow he avoids accidents—but not reveal the driver who rarely does anything wrong but who, when he does make a mistake, is likely to be involved in a fatality.

As a result, most of what we know about the effect of drugs upon driving comes from investigations of accidents that involved persons under the influence of some intoxicant. It is hardly sur-prising then that we know a good deal more about the effect of alcohol on driving than about that of marijuana. First of all, it is not difficult to test for the presence of alcohol in injured or arrested drivers, and second, a much larger proportion of our driving population uses alcohol.

Alcohol and Driving

The United States Department of Transportation has summed up the data in its conclusion that alcohol is a major contributor to the Vty-five thousand yearly highway fatalities in the United States and to the automobile accidents that disable nearly two million Americans every year.30

Probably the most interesting fact about alcohol-related accidents is that, contrary to the common belief, their primary cause is not simple social drinking. Several recent investigations have shown dramatically that, to an extent not previously realized, it is the alcoholic who becomes involved in the serious accidents. Thus, in one of the most careful surveys of this issue, Dr. Julian Waller, now of the University of Vermont Medical School, estimated that while alcoholics in the State of California account for 6.5 percent of the driver population and for ten percent of the total mileage, they are involved in between forty-one and sixty-two percent of the known traffic crashes.31 A study of seventy-two Michigan drivers responsible for fatal collisions showed that forty percent were chronic alcoholics and ten percent more were "problem" drinkers.32 Another, of ninety-six drivers, showed that thirty-seven percent of those responsible for fatal crashes were alco-holics who had been drinking at the time.33

There is, of course, one major methodological problem in all of these studies, a problem similar to that encountered in the discussion of alcohol and aggression. It is possible that alcohol is not as responsible as one might think for these fatal accidents. It might be merely that the same type of person who becomes an alcoholic is, for entirely different reasons, likely to become involved in fatal collisions. This is not so farfetched as it might seem. Typically, the alcoholic suffers from severe personal problems. Some are a direct result of his drinking, but often the drinking is an effort to allay the anxieties caused by an underlying mental pathology. Insofar as this is the case, it may be that the underlying problems, not the alcoholism, cause the driver behavior resulting in accidents.

On the other hand, there is reason to believe that alcohol use does directly cause the type of driving that we would expect to be involved in fatal crashes. Even among nonalcoholics the fatality rate among those who have been drinking is much higher than for those who stay sober.34 Furthermore, we have psychological tests on the qualities one would think necessary for safe driving. These reveal significant and increasing levels of iinpair-ment of vision, muscular coordination, sense of balance, and judgment with increasing levels of concentration of blood alcohol.33 Indeed, considering the magnitude of these effects, the question ceases to be why those under the influence of alcohol get into so many automobile accidents. Rather we might ask how they manage to drive as safely as they seem to do.

Marijuana and Driving

So far as driving under the influence of marijuana is con-cerned, our information is quite scanty for several reasons. First, the lack of a test for the drug has made more difficult the studies of the specific accidents that have been so illuminating in the case of alcohol. Secondly, the effects of marijuana—at least in the dosages ordinarily used—are much more subtle than those of alcohol. And finally, the problems of laboratory experimentation discussed in Chapter III make the kind of experimental evidence that was valuable in the alcohol area much more difficult to obtain for marijuana. Despite this last problem, however, the experimental evidence has been of some help. If it sheds relatively little light on the effect of the use of marijuana on driving, it at least destroys some of the popular myths on the issue. Thus, probably the most widely circulated medical discussion of mari-juana states that the user may enter a motor vehicle and with "teashades" (dark sunglasses worn because of dilated pupils) over his handicapped eyes and with impaired reflexes he may plow through a crowd of pedestrians.36

If there are two things that the experimental research does reveal, they are that marijuana does not dilate the pupils and that it does not impair the reflexes.

The Crancer Study
In addition, there is at least some evidence that the mari-juana-using driver is a much less serious problem than his alcohor-using counterpart. Probably the most dramatic evidence of this is the study by Crancer and his co-workers, who ran a series of driving simulator tests to compare the effects of mari-juana and alcohol use.37 The investigating team consisted of the three members of the State of Washington Department of Motor Vehicles' Division of Research and both a psychiatrist and a pharmacologist from the University of Washington Medical School.

The study, in essence, tested each of its thirty-six subjects-- marijuana-users who were also "familiar with the effects of alcohol"—three times: once, as a control, under the influence of no drug at all; once with a "normal social high" dose of marijuana; and once with two large drinks of alcohol, which were intended to put his blood-alcohol level at approximately .10 percent (in most states the presumptive level for drunken driving is at .15 percent). In each test the subject "drove" the simulator for three periods of twenty-three minutes beginning one half hour, two and a half hours, and four hours after the "drug" use.

Using standard statistical techniques, the author of the paper determined that there was no significant difference between the performance under the influence of marijuana and under no drug at all but that there was a considerable difference between these two and the performance under alcohol. Indeed, the graph of their results shows this dramatically.

There are, however, several possible methodological flaws in the Crancer study. It is possible that the subjects, who were marijuana-users, to make "their drug" look as good as possible, did worse than they could have on the control experiment and much worse on the experiment under alcohol. Crancer feels that this is unlikely because

it would have been very difficult intentionally and effectively to manipulate error scores on a given test or sequence of tests. . . . [Because] we found no significant difference in the mean error scores preceding the treatments of marijuana, alcohol, and control. This suggests that subjects were not "set" to perform better or worse on the date of a particular treatment. . . . [And because] an inspection of chance variation of individual error scores for [the marijuana] treatment shows about half the subjects doing worse and half better than under control conditions.38

It is also possible that the doses of marijuana and alcohol used were not comparable. The dose of alcohol, while well under that set for drunken driving in most states, does seem more than an ordinary cocktail-party amount. And, on the other hand, it is possible that the marijuana dose was not high enough. This, per-haps, is rendered somewhat less likely by the facts that the subjects each had two normal marijuana cigarettes, a dose at least as great as taken under usual social circumstances; that the amount of marijuana was checked against a separate group using pulse rate as an indicator of the amount of active ingredients consumed; and that the subjects stated that this was about as high as they became socially. Moreover, a much smaller group consisting of only four of the subjects was tested after having consumed three times the amount used in the experiment and still showed no sig-nificant driving impairment.

Additionally, it may be argued that the sample used in the study was biased in that all of those tested were regular marijuana-users. This appears especially serious since it is likely that the effect of marijuana on driving is at its greatest in inexperienced users who are not as well able to compensate for the effects of the drug as are those more experienced. Crancer attempted to cure this methodological problem by testing four inexperienced users in addition to those in his main test. As to these, he reports that

All subjects showed either no change or negligible improvement in their scores. The results suggest that impairment in simulated driving performance is not a function of increased marijuana dosage or inexperience with drug.

This finding, while extremely interesting, is hard to consider docu-mented, primarily because the number of subjects was so small. On the other hand, if indeed the dangers of marijuana intoxication were very serious only with respect to inexperienced users, the social problem would be very much less serious than with respect to alcohol. After all, a marijuana-user cannot drive (or, for that matter, simply be) often under the influence of the drug without ceasing to be an inexperienced user. This would be exactly the opposite of the alcohol situation, where it is those who most often use the drug who are the greatest danger.

Two other methodological problems in the driving study, however, are far more troublesome. First, although it has been shown that performance on Crancer's driving simulator is statis-tically related to the subjects' past safe driving record, the relation is not an enormously strong one;" and even if it were, we do not know enough about the actual causes of accidents to conclude that the simulator could predict the safety record of those under the influence of a drug as well as it did that of those who are drug free.

Thus, the only errors accounted for in grading the simulated driving were speedometer errors, steering errors, brake errors, ac-celerator errors, signaling errors, and the total of these. It may well be that other types of errors can also be important and that the intoxicated driver might make very different kinds of fatal errors than the nonintoxicated driver. In addition, the simulator may not take sufficient account of the magnitude as well as the number of errors. It is quite possible, considering what we know of the effects of marijuana, that errors while driving might be in-frequent but that they might be extremely serious when they occur.

The final methodological problem in Crancer's study is probably the most serious. No matter how well the simulator measures driving performance at the time, it cannot measure the variables that go into safe driving on the road. It may very well be that, no matter how good the simulator is, people behave differently in a simulator. Although in the test situation marijuana-intoxicated drivers paid careful attention to what they were doing, it might be argued that under actual driving conditions their attention and motivation might be reduced.

One cannot say whether any of these methodological problems is significant. Even if all are, however, it is hard, looking at the results, to explain the gross differences between alcohol and marijuana on these bases. Moreover, there are three other studies that, though not so persuasive as that of Crancer and his co-workers, nonetheless shed some light on this issue.

These three studies have compared the driving records of a sample of marijuana-users with those of a comparable sample who did not use marijuana.40 In each case the marijuana-using sample seemed to have a significantly higher number of traffic violations on their records but not a greater number of accidents. The increased number of traffic violations might be explained on the theory that the marijuana-users by the very nature of their drug use show themselves to be less law-abiding people. Perhaps, then, in situations where safety was not really at stake they would be more likely to violate the traffic laws. The fact that the number of accidents was no greater takes on added significance because of the many studies showing that comparably heavy drinkers are involved in considerably more accidents than is the population at large.41 Again we can reach no firm conclusion from this because it is possible that the marijuana-users did not use their drug so heavily or else did not drive under its influence sufficiently often so that a statistical difference would be noted. Such studies on driv-ing records are, after all, very crude indications of a likelihood of serious accidents.

Moving on, then, to the laboratory data on marijuana, we can say that if driving is a complex task, the chances are it will be adversely affected by marijuana use. The problem is that it is not at all clear that the vast majority of driving situations—even emergencies—are, in this sense, complex tasks. This is not to say that marijuana use could not lead to a discernible impairment in many situations. It is likely that the marijuana-intoxicated driver will be more likely to miss roadside signs or to become confused in executing complicated maneuvers. One would be surprised in that case if this did not lead to a higher frequency of accidents. Indeed, a substantial number of marijuana-users feel that driving under the influence of marijuana is very dangerous.

Moreover if other studies confirm the report of Keeler42 that the effect of marijuana use can recur spontaneously in a user not under the influence of the drug, this will add to the seriousness of the problem. This effect, though it has been reported to occur frequently to LSD-users, is extremely rare with marijuana-users. Usually it occurs after an adverse reaction and seems to be much more the reliving of a panic reaction than it is the experience of any perceptual changes felt during the marijuana use.

On the other hand, compared with the vast information we have on alcohol and the obviously serious effects of alcohol on driving, it is likely that the impairment caused by marijuana use, though perhaps serious, is of a considerably lesser order of magnitude.
Finally, after examining the data with respect to driving abilities under marijuana and alcohol, there is one further point to be made as to the symmetry argument. The fact is that a test for marijuana use is on the way. It has already been announced once—prematurely, it turns out—but the scientific problems in devising such a test are not enormously difficult. To develop a blood or urine test for marijuana the scientist must merely tag with radioactive tracers various parts of the delta-1 tetrahydrocannabinol molecule and determine which substances in the blood are a recog-nizable metabolic product of this ingredient of marijuana. Since it is biochemically almost inconceivable that a substance as complex as a tetrahydrocannabinol will fail to produce any identifiable breakdown products, the likelihood is overwhelming that such a test will be forthcoming within a matter of two or three years to moot the point entirely.

Marijuana Versus Alcohol

The preceding discussions of the effects of alcohol on crime, on the physical and mental health of its users, and upon automobile driving are only indicative, and not exhaustive, of the harm caused by alcohol in our society. But even after so cursory a look, it becomes extremely difficult to argue that marijuana somehow is a more serious menace. Indeed, one of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission's reasons for recommending against the criminalization of marijuana was that

To repress the hemp drugs in India and to leave alcohol alone would be misunderstood by a large number of persons who believe, and apparently not without reason, that more harm is done in this country by the latter than the former.43

When someone attempts to argue the contrary, a short cross-examination seems all that is necessary to bring out the facts. Note, for instance, how easily the concession was elicited from Dr. Edward Bloomquist, a witness testifying on the evils of marijuana before a California Senate Committee:

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: Is this [marijuana] a worse thing than alcohol? Should we, by virtue of your logic, also unlegalize or illegalize or proscribe alcohol?

DR. BLOOMQUIST: Oh, boy! You mean to bring back prohibition?

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: That's right.

DR. BLOOMQUIST: Well, of course, I have never really settled this in my own mind, because, as I look at prohibition, I wonder really who was involved in being hurt during this period. There were gangsters shooting gangsters, and this sort of thing. But I just wonder how many of the individuals who weren't actually using the drug got hurt.

There was intoxication, because people took good alcohol. Economically, there was a problem because of the crime element. Marijuana doesn't have some of the same features that alcohol has, and the same relationship. But I think the thing that off balances this is the fact that this drug, first of all, is capable of producing social bums in great quantity.

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: More so than alcohol?

DR. BLOOMQUIST: Yes. I think more so than alcohol.

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: Let's just assume it is granted that both are bad for people and we wish people didn't use either marijuana or alcohol, but alcohol, however, is legal now. Why not marijuana?

DR. BLOOMQUIST: For one thing, people recognize, even though they may enjoy drinking alcohol socially, they recognize this drug has tremendously negative effects. Pathetically, very few of the population seem to recognize anything wrong with marijuana.

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: What if everybody started using it and it became obvious—

DR. BLOOMQUIST: I think it would be obvious very fast, and then you find yourselves in the very ridiculous position we are in today of 'legislators having to pass law after law on alcohol trying to control it. I think you would be just as busy doing the same thing for marijuana.

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: I think you are escaping the essential ques-tion that we proscribe marijuana—

DR. BLOOMQUIST: Totally proscribe?

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: As we have done with alcohol.

DR. BLOOMQUIST: I am sorry; what?

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: The basic problem, aside from abuse, Or under the influence to do something bad, under existing laws if you do that with alcohol you are in trouble. Basically, we are proscrib-ing or making illegal all use or possession of marijuana and not doing that with alcohol. We are just saying if there are bad side effects from your alcohol, you are in trouble. But you are certainly free to drink. Why can't we do the same with marijuana?

Again, I am being argumentative. What is the difference?

DR. BLOOMQUIST: For one thing, marijuana has no social attribute except for the fact that some people like to use it. No medicinal effect. Not a drug which society can encompass except in one capacity, and that is as an escape drug.

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON : You are evading the question again because we could be using alcohol only for medicinal purposes.

DR. BLOOMQUIST : Sure. Of course. There may be perversion, but then—

CHAIRMAN BEILENSON: Is there a distinction? Is there something worse about marijuana than alcohol? Or, are they just both bad things which we wish people didn't use?

DR. BLOOMQUIST: I would almost have to equate the two of them."

A recent medical text on pharmacology devotes a small sec-tion to comparing the dangers of alcohol and marijuana:

Marijuana is often compared to alcohol. Long-term abuse of alcohol is commonly associated with physical deterioration whereas long-term abuse of marijuana is not. Unlike marijuana, „alcohol is physically addicting, and tolerance does not develop to marijuana. When inebriated, the alcoholic usually suffers a greater loss of judgment and control than the marijuana user, whose "highs" are usually characterized by alterations in perception and mood with-out a marked loss of behavioral control. Aggressive drives are commonly released by alcohol, rarely by marijuana. The appetite is stimulated by marijuana, whereas calories are provided by alcohol. The hangover of the alcoholic is unknown to the "pot-head," who awakens the next morning feeling refreshed. Psycho-logic dependence on either drug may develop, and both drugs impair the physical performance essential to safe automobile driv-ing. Acute psychotic and near-psychotic reactions are more com-mon with the marijuana user than with the social drinker, but are frequently observed in the acute and chronic brain syndromes of chronic alcoholism.45

It would seem that on the strength of this, without even considering the vastly greater social damage attributable to alcohol, the medical evidence would at least point against treating marijuana more severely than alcohol.

The "Two Wrongs" Argument

Advocates of marijuana criminalization have, at least recently, made little effort to show that marijuana is more harmful than alcohol and have generally assumed that the drugs are equally dangerous. On this basis, the argument for the criminalization of marijuana, as phrased by Ernest M. Gentry, then Assistant U. S. Commissioner of Narcotics, is that

the attempts to compare marijuana with alcohol regardless of how successful, can produce no guide to action. Surely, it is not valid to justify the adoption of a new vice by trying to show that it is no worse than a presently existing one. The result in any case can only be added damage from a new source.48

Dr. Edward Bloomquist phrases the argument in this way:

It is a fallacy to suggest that the existence of one evil excuses or encourages the establishment of another. Indeed, the existence of alcoholism and of skid rows is not an argument in favor of can-nabis but one against it. If alcohol has ruined six million lives in this country how can it possibly be an argument for permitting cannabis to do the same, or worse?47

Dr. Donald Louria in The Drug Scene argues the issue slightly differently:

Indeed marijuana's dangers in regard to psychic damage and potential hazards for those driving under the influence, seem no greater than the documented deleterious effects of alcohol. If the question before us were a national referendum to decide whether we will use for one of our legitimate escape mechanisms either alcohol or marijuana, I might personally vote for marijuana but that is not the question. The question is simply whether we are to add to our alcohol burden another intoxicant.48

There is certainly truth in the argument that the decision to license the sale of alcohol does not in itself mean that we must do the same with marijuana—or with any other substance no more dangerous than alcohol. The law need not conform to this type of abstract symmetry. If the facts supported such a position, we might rationally acknowledge that Prohibition was repealed because alcohol was too firmly established in our culture, but as to marijuana we may still strangle the baby monster in its cradle. It is true that in the alcohol area it was graphically demonstrated that we had little choice but to abandon Prohibition and to proceed by the licensing-with-controls route. At least looking at it from today's vantage point, it is reasonably clear that with the resources, both financial and social, which we were prepared to devote to the problem, Prohibition could never have been enforced.

On the other hand, though, it is steadily becoming clearer that this is also true as to marijuana. The fact is, as discussed in the final chapter, that it is most unlikely that the criminalization of marijuana will ever be enforceable with anything like the re-sources we are prepared to devote to the problem. Arguments such as those of Mr. Gentry and Drs. Bloomquist and Louria are cor-rect in implicitly recognizing that the issue of what we should do with marijuana depends not upon our posture toward al-cohol but entirely upon the total social costs as opposed to the benefits of the varying legal postures toward marijuana. The problem is that they fail in two vital particulars. First, they do not devote any real attention to the costs of the marijuana laws; and second, and of more relevance in this chapter, they do not ask what effect our treatment of alcohol has upon this issue.

The Costs of the "Two Wrongs" Argument

The costs of accepting the argument that society cannot afford the dual vices of alcohol and marijuana use are primarily a conse-quence of one factor: that, to a great extent, "social" marijuana smokers are a different population from alcohol drinkers. It is one thing for the law to tell each person that one such vice is enough for him and that society will not permit him two because of the cumulative damage they might do; it is a very different thing to tell each person that because of the cumulative effect of the two vices, he must confine himself to alcohol.

We must remember that, in our society, marijuana is a drug of youth, and hence the older generation of alcohol drinkers is, in essence, saying to the young, many of whom are of voting age and legally competent adults, "Even though your vice is certainly no worse than ours, we legalize our vice, but make yours illegal, because we cannot afford both." To the young, and especially to those who do not have the vote, this is pure hypocrisy, simply the action of a politically powerful majority that prefers its interests at the expense of a less politically powerful, but no less worthy, minority.

A similar point, relating marijuana to broader concerns, was put with some vigor by one young man, at the time a law student and now an associate in one of Los Angeles' most prestigious firms:

The characterization of the old order came to be one of hypoc-risy—of presidents who cried for peace while waging war, of governors who lauded law and order while ignoring wholesale injustice . . . of legislators and police who denounced the evils of marijuana while swilling martinis.. . .49

Entirely apart from the impact this view has on the respect of the young for democratic principles is the very practical prob-lem of criminal law enforcement. For a criminal law to be effective, it must, in all but the most unusual cases, have a solid moral base. It must be accepted, at least in some measure, by the great ma-jority of those at whom it is directed. If this is not the case, unless enforcement is extremely easy or vast resources are devoted to the problem, the law, like Prohibition, will prove unenforceable. The problem with the argument that marijuana, though no worse than alcohol, should nonetheless be made illegal, is that it abandons an appeal either to morality or to reason, and substitutes an appeal to pure force.

The law regards consistency as a great virtue. We are told that when distinctions are made in the law, they should be based upon reason, because the greater the number of inconsistencies there are in the law, the less respect it will receive. If society can-not afford the ravages of both marijuana and alcohol, and one is no worse_ than the other, it may be that they both should be re-stricted in the same way. Perhaps this would envision greater con-trols upon alcohol and lesser ones on marijuana. But so long as the legal distinction between the two intoxicants is as great as it is at present, the marijuana laws will be seen by their addressees as having no claim to moral authority.

The failure of the marijuana laws to exert moral suasion on young people today has effects beyond simply making them, as a practical matter, unenforceable. This, in great part, is responsible for the defects in our drug-education programs. The drug educa-tor, forced by his position to defend the law, is in a very difficult position. Rather than trying to impart knowledge or wisdom he must merely get the young to obey—without invoking the aid of morality or reason. Note, for instance, how this affected one educa-tor, the director of school health, physical education, and safety in a large suburban school system:

In order to know exactly what it is that they should stay away from, students must know the nature of drugs. . . . They're pro-vided with basic facts. These facts aren't given "objectively"— they're slanted, so there's not the slightest doubt that students understand just how dangerous drugs can be.

You can call it brainwashing if you want to. We don't care what you call it—as long as these youngsters get the point.50

The problem is that the "youngsters" do get the point. They know their educators dispense slanted "facts" and, unfortunately, as we have seen in Chapters VI and VII, they often act accordingly.

One could go on at some length listing the costs in a demo-cratic society of threats by the state of force, rather than appeals to reason or morality. For our purpose here, however, only one further aspect of the comparison between marijuana and alcohol must be noted.

The Moral Aspect of Drug Laws

Our society's treatment of alcohol makes it clear that the only criterion for judging the marijuana laws can be the utilitarian one adopted here of weighing their costs against their benefits. But for the treatment of alcohol, one might argue that it was irrelevant that the costs of the marijuana laws far exceeded their benefits and that essentially noncriminal methods of controlling the drug would achieve a better balance. It might be argued that, because of a moral imperative, we must criminalize marijuana regardless of the costs.

Reasoning based upon a moral imperative is hard to refute with data. In its nature, what is good and evil is not subject to cost accounting. On the other hand, whatever the rational distinctions between alcohol and marijuana with respect to their physical, men-tal, and social dangers, It is impossible to draw any moral distinc-tion between the two drugs. Both are intoxicants that are used recreationally for pleasure and without medical supervision. Nor is it possible to argue that marijuana use is somehow "unnatural" and that people should "get drunk like the good Lord intended them to." Indeed, even the recognition that alcohol is a drug—as it of course is, by any rational definition—makes impossible the moral argument against marijuana prohibition. It is one thing to inveigh against the immorality of drug use. It is far more difficult to summon up fervor in inveighing against drug use other than that of alcohol and tobacco.

In short, no moral distinction exists—or for that matter, has been suggested—that allows us to license alcohol for sale and yet criminalize marijuana. We are hence remitted to the realm of pure practicality: the effect of differing methods of controlling mari-juana, a subject we will take up in the next chapter.

The Additive Effect Fallacy

Before moving on, however, we must clear up two other areas bearing on the relation between marijuana and alcohol. The first is the assumption implicit in the "two wrongs" argu-ment that the harmful effects of marijuana in the population are merely added to those of alcohol; the second is the possibility that some reason other than the dangers of the two drugs permits us to distinguish so grossly between them.

The additive effect fallacy is really a double error. First, it assumes that the total damage attributable to marijuana would be of the same order of magnitude as that presently attributable to alcohol, an assumption that would be true only if the long-range effects of marijuana turned out to be far more damaging than is likely under our present evidence. Second, entirely apart from this, it by no, means follows that the number of users damaged by marijuana would merely be added to those with alcohol problems. Even though each person whose personality requires that he abuse a drug has his "favorite" drug for this purpose, it is not the drug that is the most important cause of the abuse. We must therefore examine the possibility that rather than increasing the total num-ber of drug abusers, the wider availability of marijuana would merely mean that many abusers of alcohol would switch to marijuana.

There is already data showing that a sizable percentage of marijuana-users do cut down their alcohol consumption on taking up their new drug. Thus, Richard Blum's data shows that fifty-four percent of the regular (weekly) marijuana-users decreased their alcohol consumption after taking up marijuana, while only two percent increased their alcohol use. With respect to the daily marijuana-users, the difference was even more striking. Here eighty-nine percent of the users had decreased their alcohol consumption.51

This type of data is confirmed from several other sources. Another study at a California college showed that while in the sample marijuana use had climbed from nineteen to forty-three percent between 1967 and 1968, use of alcohol in the "more than once a month" category had fallen from twenty-nine to fourteen percent, while use in the "more than several times a month" category had fallen from seventeen to twelve percent." And one of the most recent surveys, at Stanford University, showed that, at a time in their lives when students typically increase their alcohol consumption significantly, only three percent of the marijuana-users had increased the frequency or quantity of their hard-liquor consumption while thirty-two percent reported a decrease.53 The decrease in alcohol use seems to extend to abuse as well. There are several reports similar to that of Dr. Seymour HaHeck, a pro-fessor of psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin, who has written of the rapid increase in marijuana use on his campus:

Perhaps the one major positive effect of the drug [marijuana] is to cut down on the use of alcohol. In the last few years it is rare for our student infirmary to encounter a student who has become aggressive, disoriented, or physically ill because of excessiveause of alcohol. Alcoholism has almost ceased to become a problem on our campuses.54

Of course, at least a portion of the marijuana-users will not merely be drawn from the ranks of those who would otherwise injure themselves with alcohol. To some extent the damage wrought by the two drugs is additive. As discussed in the next chapter, however, most of those who are most likely to be mari-juana abusers will use the drug regardless of any prohibition.

Moreover, any additional harm done in our society by mari-juana will have to be balanced against the possible improvement in the health of those alcoholics who switch to marijuana. Though this must await more complete examination, there are a number of reports55 that alcoholics who have taken up (albeit illegally) marijuana have cut down sharply on their alcohol consumption and as a result have greatly improved not only in their physical and mental health but in their family and employment relations as well. Dr. Tod Mikuriya, a San Francisco psychiatrist involved in the treatment of alcoholism, has reported that he himself has pointed out to several of his patients the improvements that might result from their switch from alcohol to marijuana use. Though he, of course, could not supply the drug, he has reported that at least some patients, who have found their own sources, have made gratifying improvement.56

Rationalizations for Unequal Treatment

There is one final area we must clear up before moving on to the alternatives to marijuana criminalization. Even though it is generally conceded by those familiar with the issue that, at least as used in the United States today, marijuana is no more harmful than alcohol, it by no means follows that all attack the unequal legal treatment of the two drugs. Quite apart from the "two wrongs" argument, a large variety of defenses of the differen-tial treatment have been made that, if substantial, might provide a moral and rational justification for the unequal treatment. First among these is the "low potency" argument, as phrased by Donald E. Miller, Chief Counsel of the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs:

In the marijuana which is distributed in the illicit traffic of this country, it is common to find conglomerations consisting of leaves, seeds, stems, and tops, in spite of the fact that nearly all of the active principle of the plant is contained only in the resins of the flowering tops of the female plant. This adulteration is a consequence of the present enforcement activity, and while this policing efficiency has the desirable benefit of lessening the amount of the active ingredients consumed in the United States, it also unfortunately results in concealing from investigators the full danger involved in its use. The low purity of the marijuana which is avail-able results in disguising its consumption as a causative factor in crime and mental illness, a connection which is much more ap-parent in those who have used the more concentrated forms such as hashish. Moreover the difficulties of obtaining even the adulter-ated preparations further conceal the damage of chronic consumption.

... It should be realized that if the consumption of marijuana were legalized the natural consumer demands would result in the marketing of a more refined and consequently more dangerous product than is usually obtainable.57

There are several basic observations to be made about this argument. Mr. Miller himself has argued:

VVhether a person is using the so-called "Mexican type" marijuana or the more potent "hashish," the potential for abuse is ever present. The only difference is that a user of hashish will not need to smoke as much to reach the desired result. But make no mistake about it, a person can continue the intake of the weaker substance and attain the same result as the person using "hashish."55

Moreover, those who credit the view that it is the law-enforcement effort that has reduced the potency of the available marijuana make no effort to relate it to the argument that marijuana-users graduate to heroin because they find that marijuana is not strong enough for them.

More important, this argument assumes that the users of mari-juana are attempting to get the strongest and most powerful product that they can. In fact, at least in the most carefully studied cultures in the United States, this seems not to be the case." Certainly there is no doubt that if hashish or any other concentrated product of marijuana were freely available, some percentage of the present marijuana-users would use that more potent drug. Whether this would lead to any increase in the intake of active ingredients, how-ever, is another question entirely. We must remember that the great majority of marijuana smokers titrate their doses and take no more than they wish. At least for most of these, the significance of using stronger forms of the drug would simply be that they would take less.

In Britain, the economics of smuggling dictates that the avail-able drug be as strong ounce for ounce as possible. Yet according to the Wootton report, the hashish used there is no more a danger than marijuana is in the United States. Other countries too have found no tendency for their better-integrated citizens, of whom we presumably have a much higher percentage, to use more of their stronger forms of the drug.

Finally, and most important, if it is the stronger forms of mari-juana that we are worried about, as becomes clear in the next chapter, we are going at the problem in exactly the wrong way.

We would be far better off licensing the sale of the competitive weaker forms than we are by making strong and weak forms equally subject to the criminal law.

The task of justifying our grossly dissimilar treatment of alco-hol and marijuana has been attempted in many other ways. The most complete collection of these has been made by Richard Blum and Jeanne Wahl:

THE ALCOHOL—MARIJUANA DILEMMA

Any thoughtful citizen can find himself hard pressed to ex-plain or justify the legal prohibition against the use of marijuana or hallucinogens in a society which accepts alcohol use and all its attendant woes. Historians and cultural anthropologists may shed some light on the origins of this double standard, but the law-enforcement officer who works with drugs may nevertheless be troubled by what seems to be incompatible with his sense of fair-ness or, indeed, nonsensical in terms of the demonstrable dangers arising out of alcohol use as opposed to the more questionable dangers associated with marijuana use. How does the officer come to terms with these inconsistencies? What evidence does he bring to bear either to justify or to condemn the laws which he must enforce?

Among the officers in our sample, the following positions were most often set forth in response to our question about the differ-ence between alcohol and marijuana use:

(a) Both are intoxicating, but marijuana creates criminal tendencies.
(b) Unlike alcohol, marijuana use, itself not dangerous, leads to the use of heroin.
(c) Both the drunk and the marijuana user are befuddled by intoxication and may lose the capacity to distinguish right from wrong. But the drunk is made helpless and incapable of action by alcohol, whereas the marijuana user remains physically able and, further, may be impelled to criminal acts by the stimulation of that drug.
(d) Alcohol has a number of benign effects; it tastes good, it stimulates the appetite, it facilitates social interaction so that it is pleasant to take as well as being capable of moderate use to produce only pleasant results. Marijuana has no such inherently benign characteristics; it is not pleasurable itself, but can be used only to achieve an end state for which the means, smoking "pot," is merely instrumental.
(e) There is no difference except the social facts: alcohol is ac-ceptable and legal; marijuana use is rejected by those who set social standards, and it is illegal.
(f) Different types of persons choose to use marijuana and alco-hol; primarily those with psychopathic or antisocial trends select marijuana.
(g) The use of marijuana necessarily puts the user in association with persons operating illegally, for he depends upon them for a source of supply. Consequently, the user is exposed to a group which is likely to be immoral or unethical, and he runs the risk of adopting their dishonesty and bad habits. This exposes him to a criminal career just because of his marijuana habit.
(h) Marijuana use is associated with unpredictability of behavior, whereas alcohol use leads to predictable behavior. The mari-juana user himself may not know how he will respond to the next stick; the alcohol user knows quite well what a drink will do. Furthermore, those who live or deal with the mari-juana user not only are faced with uncertainty as to what he will do, but they have no way of knowing that he is under the influence of a drug. The alcohol user, either by smell or action, is clearly identified as being under its influence, and the persons with him can anticipate what he will do and can adjust their actions to their predictions. The marijuana user on a "high" cannot be identified by those around him (unless he tells them or has taken it with them), and so they are unprepared for irrational or reckless behavior and can do nothing to protect themselves or even the user.60

Propositions A, that marijuana causes criminal tendencies, and B, that it leads to heroin, have already been examined in previous chapters. The first is without any supporting evidence and fairly clearly is just not true. Moreover, on this issue we have seen that alcohol is a far more worthy candidate for suppression than marijuana. So far as leading to heroin is concerned, we have seen too that this, for the most part, is not true either. And, in any event, the criminalization of marijuana exacerbates rather than helps solve this problem.

Proposition C, that the drunk becomes "befuddled" and "helpless" is based on the undeniable fact that alcohol is more toxic than marijuana and hence produces unconsciousness far more quickly. Strangely enough, however, this is used as an argument for greater restrictions on marijuana. If the drunk immedi-ately passed out on taking too much alcohol, there would be no doubt that the capacity of the marijuana-user to do damage would be greater. On the other hand, a comparatively long period exists before the drunk becomes "incapable of action" during which, as we have pointed out, he can, and indeed does do, considerably more damage than the marijuana-user.

A variant of this argument, focusing on danger to the user himself, has been made by Dr. Edward Bloomquist:

Most critical of all, as the drunk gets drunker and finally collapses, the cannabis user becomes more toxic and active. He is not reduced to incoordination to the point of immobility but rather only to the point of endangering himself and others. As toxicity increases hallucinations appear and feelings of great strength and capability, usually unwarranted, begin to take over. Soon the cannabis user thinks he can walk on water, jump over buildings, or walk between the headlights of an oncoming car. Less dangerous than alcohol?61

Dr. Bloomquist, however, cites no authority for his state-ment as to the suicidal proclivities of those intoxicated by mari-juana, and so far as can be determined no such allegation is made in any medical work. Moreover, even assuming that the drunk who is made helpless is less of a risk to himself than the mari-juana-user, this hardly justifies the unequal treatment of the two drugs. Weighing this type of risk against the vastly greater risks of injury from alcohol in all sorts of other ways hardly affects the imbalance.

Argument D is even more interesting. It has been phrased somewhat more succinctly: "Marijuana, unlike alcohol, is nearly always consumed by its users for the express purpose of attaining a high, a disorienting intoxication."" As shown in Chapter III, this type of argument is based upon a complete misapprehension as to the use of marijuana in the United States. Moreover, except insofar as this does more harm than alcohol use, it is completely irrelevant to the legal treatment of the two drugs.

The other facets of this argument have little more bearing on the issue. The fact that alcohol has some benign effects is un-doubted. Whether or not it tastes good is perhaps questionable, since many drinkers go to great effort to disguise the taste of alcohol in their mixed drinks. The stimulating effect of alcohol upon the appetite certainly does exist—though, of course, in larger quan-tities it has exactly the opposite effect. However, marijuana, too, seems to stimulate the appetite. In any event, it is hard to see how appetite stimulation can be regarded as an advantage in a culture that already tends to overeat. And while alcohol may stimulate social interaction, so does marijuana—though in a different way. Finally, the argument runs, alcohol use is pleasant whereas that of marijuana is not. Not only is this emphatically disputed by those who use marijuana, but we would have great difficulty founding a criminal prohibition on this distinction. De gustibus non dis-putandum est is not usually considered a legal maxim, but it does, it would seem, cover this issue.

Proposition E is simply a restatement of the conclusion that marijuana is neither acceptable nor legal while alcohol is both. The present illegality of marijuana, however, does not help us to decide whether the criminalization of the drug is a sensible policy. And while it is true that marijuana use is not acceptable among the great majority of older people in the nation, it is equally true that it is acceptable in many areas among a growing majority of the young. In any event, in a rational society, the legality of con-duct should depend upon other issues, such as the harmfUlness of the conduct, and not merely upon its "acceptability."

Justification F, that it is the maladjusted and the psycho-pathic who turn to marijuana, may have been strikingly true in the United States several years ago; it is by no means clearly true today. Admittedly, insofar as alcohol use is more conventional in. most sections of our society, those who use alcohol and not marijuana can be expected to be somewhat more conventional and perhaps better adjusted to our society. On the other hand, among the younger group, marijuana use is becoming so widespread that it is beginning to take on the aspects of a conventional drug use, with the more disturbed unconventional drug-users turning instead to more dangerous drugs.

The significant fact, in any event, is that the marijuana use does not appear to be the cause of any differences between the marijuana-using and the nonusing populations, except perhaps for those differences in alienation caused by the criminalization of the drug itself. If marijuana use is to be outlawed because we wish to make a criminal of the type of person who uses it itself rather than because of the drug's effects, we are starting on a very dan-gerous road. It would then be much more forthright to make it a crime to be less satisfied with one's self and the outside society or to show any of all the other predictors of marijuana use or, for that matter, dissatisfaction with our society. Presumably, we do not wish to punish an attitude, as no pluralistic society should. And, if we did, we would probably do much better in terms both of ease of detection and of prediction of alienation if, like certain develop-ing countries, we made criminal long hair and beards.63

The statements in G, that marijuana use puts one in contact with the criminals who deal in the drug and that this is unhealthy both for the user and for society, are certainly true; but they, of course, merely emphasize another cost of our criminalization of marijuana rather than an intrinsic danger of the drug. As we will see in the next chapter, this is an argument against making posses-sion of the marijuana legal while continuing to make sales of the drug criminal; it is certainly no argument against treating marijuana the way we do alcohol.

Argument H, the predictability issue, is probably the most complex bf the rationales. It involves a double unpredictability on the part of marijuana: first, that the effect upon the user is un-predictable; and second, that, because the user cannot be recog-nized so easily, his effect upon others is that much more unpredict-able. Insofar as the unpredictability of the effect of marijuana upon its user is concerned, there is little doubt that subjective effects of marijuana are more a function of the mood of the user and of the social setting than are the effects of alcohol, and that this problem is aggravated by the variations in the potency of the mari-juana sold on the illegal market. On the other hand, as previously pointed out, the unpredictability of marijuana's effects involves in the great majority of users a much narrower range than is usually assumed. The variation in the effects is typically a matter of in-terest only to the user, since all it does is make some drug experi-ences pleasant and others unpleasant for him.

As we have seen, except for violations of the marijuana laws themselves, the behavioral effects of alcohol are far more likely to bring one into trouble with the law than are those of marijuana. Indeed, on the common-sense assumption that people who drink do not expect thereby to get involved in fights or other trouble, it would seem that, at least as to these effects, alcohol consumption is considerably less predictable than that of marijuana.

The second point concerns the difficulty of recognizing that someone is under the influence of marijuana. There is certainly no doubt that the excessive user of alcohol is far more easy to recog-nize than his marijuana counterpart. On the other hand, it is strange reasoning that holds that a drug that causes grossly unusual behavior should, for that reason, be more tolerated than one that affects conduct in a more subtle and less discernible way. Mari-juana intoxication is much more difficult to recognize than alcohol intoxication in great part because the consequences to those around the marijuana-user are not nearly so serious. One of the reasons why we are able to spot the belligerent drunk is because he is un-naturally belligerent. The marijuana-user, on the other hand, may be unnaturally happy or quiet and withdrawn, but his behavior attracts considerably less attention. Moreover, until one can show—as is probable only in the case of automobile driving—that a marijuana-user is more likely to be dangerous than someone under tfie influence of no drug at all (who therefore presumably is the hardest to recognize), it cannot really be argued that this is a serious reason for criminalizing marijuana use.

In addition to the reasons collected by Blum and Wahl, sev-eral other distinctions--some quite unpersuasive, some less' so-- may be advanced for discriminating between alcohol and mari-juana. In the first category probably belongs the statement of the American Medical Association that "One or two drinks a day normally have little effect. On the other hand, one or two reefers can produce marijuana intoxication.64

Perhaps if a marijuana cigarette were consumed as easily as a martini or highball, this argument might make some sense. In fact, in the context of the prevailing use patterns, the equation of a single marijuana cigarette with a single cocktail is nonsense. In the course of an evening in which a moderate drinker would drink three or four cocktails, a moderate marijuana-user would probably smoke one cigarette. There is no evidence that marijuana-users as a group use their drug to excess more often than do alcohol-users.

In short, so far as the danger to the user or to society is con-cerned, it is impossible to make a rational case that marijuana should be treated more stringently than is alcohol.

Back to Prohibition

There is, of course, one further way out of this dilemma, and that is to argue that it is alcohol rather than marijuana that we are treating wrongly. One authority on marijuana has pointed out that

legalization . . . has done little to counteract the alcohol problem. Moonshining has become big business with the production of a growing number of violators with no intention of being caught or stopped. As a result, more alcohol revenue agents are murdered each year than are narcotics agents. . . . Permissiveness to alcohol has created a growing illicit business, rather than eliminating alcoholism.65

Generally, however, this is used merely as a debating point. No one argues that the repeal of Prohibition has solved all of the problem's of alcoholism—and, indeed, some have probably be-come worse since 1933.

On the other hand, the other social costs of Prohibition were so enormous, and the alcoholism problem was so obviously grow-ing worse, that the repeal of Prohibition was a social decision that very 'few seriously question today. Despite this, however, it is likely that the intellectual confrontation over marijuana and alco-hol may make us take more seriously the various social means short of the criminal law that can substantially mitigate the prob-lem of alcoholism. We are only beginning to take this problem seriously. Restrictions on alcohol advertising, effective temperance education, and adequate treatment programs for alcoholics are, at best, primitive today. The same is true of marijuana, though, of course, this problem is somewhat less urgent. In both cases, however, the needed programs are not made inevitable by the abandonment of criminalization—they are merely made prac-ticable. This makes even more important the task of designing alternatives to marijuana criminalization—the subject of the next chapter.

Summary

In comparing marijuana and alcohol, we focus upon four areas involving the effects of the two drugs: (1) criminogenic effects; (2) physical damage to the user; (3 ) the causa-tion of mental illness or other psychological harm; and (4) the problem of automobile driving.

With regard to the criminogenic effects of the two drugs, we can say, on the basis of Chapter IV, that marijuana use does not appear to cause violent crime, and there are no allegations of a connection between marijuana use and crixnes against property in the United States.

There is, however, strong evidence of criminogenic effects at-tributable to alcohol. Because of a number of methodological problems, we cannot conclude with complete certainty from this evidence that there is a causal connection between alcohol and crime, but the statistics are more than suggestive. There is no doubt that alcohol is involved in a large percentage of crimes of violence in the United States, especially homicide. This involvement is cer-tainly consistent with alcohol's known effect of releasing emotion and lessening cortical control over anger.

With regard to the physical effects of the two drugs, we have seen that the physical effects of normal marijuana use are relatively harmless. The same is true of normal alcohol use. The effects of alcohol overuse seem, however, to be significantly more serious than those of marijuana overuse. The acute physical effects of overindulgence in alcohol are not terribly damaging in most cases, except for injuries sustained as a result of drunkenness, though it is virtually certain that these effects are as likely to be serious as those of marijuana. The chronic physical effects of al-cohol use are vastly more serious. They can, and frequently do, involve serious nutritional problems, peripheral neuritis, gastric inflammation, and fatal liver disease.

It is difficult to compare the mental damage caused by the two drugs since, as discussed in Chapter V, we do not know the mental damage that may be a consequence of long-term marijuana overuse, and it may be that marijuana is a great deal more damag-ing than apparently reliable information suggests. On the other hand, even resolving all legitimate doubts in favor of the greatest possible danger for marijuana, it would be hard to match the known dangers of overuse of alcohol. About seven percent of our drinkers are alcoholics, as are twenty-two percent of the first admissions of males to psychiatric wards. In an alcoholic, cur-tailment of drinking can result in the "shakes," and later in the D.T.'s (which usually require hospitalization); and prolonged alco-hol abuse kills brain cells and frequently results in intellectual deterioration. Alcohol also is connected with other forms of mental damage, is associated with various common psychoses, and may aggravate other independent ailments, such as cerebral hemor-rhaging.

The final area of comparison between alcohol and marijuana is that of automobile driving. Here the advocates of marijuana criminalization assume that the two drugs are equally dangerous, and justify their very different legal treatment on the ground that we do not yet have any blood or urine test to reveal the driver under the influence of marijuana.

The probability, however, is that alcohol is considerably more dangerous than marijuana for the automobile driver, although one should' be careful not to draw from this the inference that driving under the influence of marijuana is safe. The study supporting such a conclusion has far too many methodological difficulties to permit that—and the effect of marijuana on the performance of complex tasks makes the conclusion somewhat unlikely. On the other hand, especially when one considers how many of our automobile fatali-ties are due to alcoholism and not simply to social drinking, it becomes likely that marijuana is far less a threat to highway safety than alcohol.

Moreover, entirely apart from this, a test for marijuana in-toxication is in the offing, and when it is perfected, the distinction at the base of this argument will disappear.

In sum, it seems almost certain that marijuana is no more harmful to the individual or to society than is alcohol, and indeed, it is quite likely that marijuana is less so. Even some of the best-known advocates of marijuana criminalization have admitted the former proposition. A host of arguments, however, are made for stricter laws against marijuana than against alcohol.

The most significant of these is that, granting that marijuana is no more harmful than alcohol, the allowance of one vice is no reason to allow another. This argument contends that although the Prohibition experience proved we could not control alcohol use, it is not inconceivable that without too vast an increase in our present efforts we could greatly improve our control over marijuana. We will discuss this issue in the final chapter, but, to anticipate, it will turn out that this is most unlikely.

In addition, the argument that we cannot afford the two vices ignores the fact that marijuana and alcohol are to a great extent preferred by two different populations. The significance of this is that, in order for laws to be practically enforceable, those governed must accept them as moral and not merely the act of a hypocritical majority that attempts to protect its own drug use at the expense of that of others. So long as we retain the enormous disparity between the legal treatment of alcohol and that of marijuana, the cost of the marijuana laws in alienating the young and in interfering with drug education will not decrease.

Finally, since it is impossible to draw any moral distinction between alcohol and marijuana, the only acceptable distinction between the drugs would be a practical one. In that case, the "two wrongs" argument must simply be that, as to alcohol, the costs of Prohibition were greater than the benefits. The problem, however, is that exactly the same is true of marijuana.

Finally, insofar as the argument assumes that the damage caused by alcohol and marijuana would be completely additive, it is probably wrong. To some extent increased marijuana use may displace the use of alcohol, and at least some alcoholics have im-proved physically and mentally on making the substitution.

The remainder of the arguments justifying the difference in treatment between alcohol and marijuana either have been dis-cussed previously or are so flimsy as not to require extended discussion. In the former category is the argument that marijuana use leads to heroin addiction. In the latter is the argument that marijuana use invariably places the user in contact with criminals who are a corrupting influence in other ways. The problem with this argument, of course, is that contact with the criminal subculture is one of the costs of marijuana criminalization.

NOTES
1. Blum, Richard H., "Mind Altering Drugs and Dangerous Drugs: Alcohol," in U.S. President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, Task Force Report: Drunkenness (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1967), p. 40.
2. Wolfgang, Marvin E., and Strohm, Rolf B., "The Relationship Between Alcohol and Criminal Homicide," Quarterly Journal of Studies on Alcohol, Vol. 17,1956, pp. 411-25.
3. Ibid., p. 423.
4. Wolfgang, Marvin E., and Ferracuti, Franco, The Subculture of Violence (London: Tavistock Publications, 1967), p. 190.
5. Ibid., p. 206.
6. Alcoholism and California: A Primary Analysis, Alcoholic Re-habilitation Division, California Public Health Department.
7. Shupe, L. M., "Alcohol and Crime: A Study of the Urine Alcohol Concentration Found in 882 Persons Arrested During or Imme-diately After the Commission of a Felony," Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Vol. 44,1954, pp. 661-64.
8. See, e.g., Bardonnel, H., "Alcoholism and Prison Statistics," Clearing Center at Resnes, 1950-51, in Ann. Med. Seq., Vol. 31, 1951, pp. 350-52; Guze, S. B., and others, "Psychiatric Illness and Crime with Particular Reference to Alcoholism: A Study of 233 Criminals," J. Nerv. Ment. Dis., Vol. 134,1962, pp. 512-21; and Whalen, R. P., and Lyons, J. J., "Medical Problems of 500 Prisoners on Admission to a County Jail," Pub. Health Rep. Wash., Vol. 77,1962, pp. 497-502.
9. Selling, L. S., "The Role of Alcohol irr the Commission of Sex Offenses," Medical Record of New York, Vol. 151, 1940, pp. 289-310.
10. Cruz, C. M., "Sexual Criminogenesis and Other Medicolegal Con-siderations," Rev. Mex. Psigulat. NeuroL, Vol. 10, 1943, pp. 3-14.
11. Johnson, Roswell D., "Some Observations on Drug Use and College Productivity," speech delivered at the Panel on Student Drug Use in the School and College for the Association of College Admission Counsellors Annual Conference, New York City, Sep-tember 26,1968.
12. Plaut, Thomas, Akohol Problems: A Report to the Nation by the Cooperative Commission on the Study of Alcoholism, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1967).
13. Blum, op cit., p. 40.
14. Pittman, David, in Blum, op. cit., pp. 8-9.
15. See Courville, Cyril B., Effects of Alcohol on the Nervous System of Man (Los Angeles: San Lucas Press), p. 20, and references cited.
16. Kessel, N., and Walton, H., Akoholism (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1967), p. 30.
17. Courville, op. cit., p. 43.
18. Kessel and Walton, op. cit., p. 32.
19. Moskow, Pennington, and Knisely, Melvin H., "Alcohol, Sludge and Hypoxic Areas of Nervous System, Liver and Heart," Micro-vascular Research, Vol. 1, 1968, p. 174. See also explanatory letter from Melvin H. Knisely, Professor and Chairman, Depart-ment of Anatomy, Medical College of South Carolina, Jan. 6, 1969.
20. Plaut, op. cit., p. 39.
21. Ibid., p. 18.
22. Kessel and Walton, op. cit., pp. 33-34.
23. Courville, op. cit., p. 60.
24. Kessel and Walton, op. cit., p. 39.
25. Ibid., p. 41.
26. Courville, op. cit., pp. 78-81.
27. Ibid., p. 81.
28. Aid., pp. 82-83.
29. Lang, Irving, "The President's Crime Commission Task Force Report on Narcotics and Drug Abuse: A Critique of the Apo-logia," Notre Dame Lawyer, Vol. 43,1968, pp. 854-55.
30. Alcohol and Highway Safety: A Report to Congress, U.S. De-partment of Transportation (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1968).
31. See Waller, J., "Chronic Medical Conditions and Traffic Safety," New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 273,1965, pp. 1413-20.
32. Selzer, Melvin, L., and Weiss, Sue, "Alcoholism and Fatal Traffic Accidents: A Study of Futility," Municipal Court Review, 1965, pp. 15-20.
33. Selzer, Melvin L., and Ehrlich, N. J., "A Controlled Study of Al-coholism, Psychopathology and Stress in 96 Drivers Causing Fatal Accidents."
34. Alcohol and Highway Safety, p. 10.
35. Caldwell, B. B., Report on Impaired Driving Tests (Ottawa: Queens Printer and Controller of Stationery, 1957). See Loomis, T. A., and West, T. C., "The Influence of Alcohol on Automobile Driving Ability," Quarterly Journal/ Studies on Alcohol, Vol. 19, March, 1958, pp. 30-46; and Dreue, G. C., and others, Effect of Small Doses of Alcohol on a Skill Resembling Driving, Medical Re-search Council Memo No. 38 (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1959).
36. Bloomquist, Edward R., "Marijuana: Social Benefit or Social Det-riment," California Medicine, Vol. 106, No. 5, May, 1967, p. 348. It is reported that more than 500,000 requests for copies of this article have been received by its publishers.
37. Crancer, Alfred, and others, "A Comparison of the Effects of Marijuana and Alcohol on Simulated Driving Performance," Science, Vol. 164, 1969, pp. 851-54.
38. Ibid., p. 854.
39. See Crancer, Alfred, Predicting Driving Performance with a Driver Simulator, Division of Research, Department of Motor Vehicles, Olympia, Washington (1968).
40. See McGlothlin, William H., Arnold, David O., and Rowan, Paul K., "Marijuana Use Among Adults" (1969), pp. 10-11; Crancer, Alfred, and Quiring, Dennis L., "Driving Records of Persons Ar-rested for Illegal Drug Use"; Waller, op. cit., p. 1417.
41. See Waller, op. cit., p. 1417.
42. Keeler, Martin H., "Spontaneous Recurrence of Marihuana Ef-fect," American Journal of Psychiatry, Vol. 125, No. 3, Sept., 1968, p. 384.
43. Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893-94 (re-printed, Silver Springs, Md.: Thomas Jefferson Publishing Co., 1969), p. 287.
44. California Senate Health and Safety Committee Hearing, Los Angeles, California, Oct. 18, 1967 (afternoon session), pp. 40- 43.
45. Gofh, A., Medical Pharmacology, 4th ed. (St. Louis: The C. V. Mosby Co., 1968), p. 330.
46. Remarks by Ernest M. Gentry, Assistant Commissioner of Nar-cotics, Before National Drug Trade Conference, Freeport, Bahama Islands, B. W. I., Jan. 24, 1968, p. 11.
47. Bloomquist, Edward R., Marijuana (Beverly Hills: Glencoe Press;1968), p. 85.
48. Louria, Donald B., The Drug Scene (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968), p. 115.
49. Commons, David, "Marijuana and Alcohol" (1968), p. 10.
50. "How One District Combats the Drug Problem," School Man-agement, 1966, p. 103.
51. Cited in Commons, op. cit., p. 23.
52. Tart, Charles T., and Klein, Carl B., "Marijuana, Alcohol, and Psychedelic (Hallucinogenic) Drug Use in a Student Population" (1969), Table 3.
53. Garfield, Emily, and Boreing, Michael, "Drug Use on a Campus" (1969), p. 13.
54. Halleck, Seymour, "Marijuana and LSD on the Campus" (1968), p. 6.
55. Downs, G., "The Use and Abuse of Marijuana and Alcohol" (1969), p. 6.
56. Mikuriya, Tod, "Cannabis Substitution as a Therapeutic Tool in the Treatment of Alcoholism" (1969).
57. Miller, Donald E., "Narcotic Drug and Marijuana Controls," Background Papers on Student Drug Involvement, Charles Hol-lander, ed. (Washington, D.C.: United States National Student Association, 1967), pp. 139-40.
58. Miller, Donald E., "The Problems of the Prosecutor in the Marijuana Controversy," paper presented to the National District Attorneys Association Conference, March 16, 1968, at New Orleans.
59. Hartsfield, P. B., "Survey of Hashish Use in the Berkeley Commu-nity" (1969); Kolovat, David V., "Hashish at Stanford" (1969).
60. Blum, Richard H., and others, Utopiates (New York: Atherton Press, 1964), pp. 227-28.
61. Bloomquist, op. cit., p. 87.
62. The Dangers of Marijuana . . . Facts You Should Know, Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (Washington: U.S. Govern-ment Printing Office, 1968), p. 11.
63. Typically in these areas it is the mini-skirt that is the indicium of alienation.
64. The Crutch That Cripples (Chicago: American Medical Associa-i    tion, 1967), p. 19.
65. Bloomquist, Edward R., "Some Observations on the Contemporary Use of Cannabis," Chap. 17 in Wittenborn, J. R., and others, Drugs and Drug Use (Springfield, Ill.: Charles C Thomas, 1969), p. 184.