When will Biden realize that liberals won the marijuana debate?
Different strains of cannabis are displayed for sale in Oakland, Calif., in 2020. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg)
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You can put the genesis of the American culture war about as far back as you want: to the Civil War, or to pretty much the first time White people set foot in this land. But most directly, it dates to the tumult of the 1960s.
On one side were the hippies, listening to rock music and getting high and having sex, while on the other side were the squares, grinding their teeth in rage. In so many ways we’re still fighting the same battles we did then.
A half-century later, there’s no doubt which side’s ideas have prevailed. Yet on one question — marijuana legalization — even though the left has most assuredly won, the Biden administration seems in no hurry to acknowledge it.
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On Tuesday, Gov. Ned Lamont (D) signed a bill making Connecticut the 19th state to legalize cannabis for recreational use. Perhaps more significant is the number 11, which is the number of states that have yet to legalize even medical marijuana. It’s a small number getting even smaller.
For an issue that is the subject of voter initiatives, bills in state legislatures and plenty of discussion on the state level, among national politicians, there’s a strange quiet. Republicans know their opposition to legalization puts them on the wrong side of the public, even in more conservative states. And many Democrats don’t much seem to want to talk about it either.
Which is odd given how clear public opinion on the issue has become. Three decades ago in the “Just Say No” 1980s, polls showed up to 80 percent of Americans opposing legalization; today, that figure has plunged to only a third, with up to two-thirds of Americans supporting recreational use. Even around half of Republicans think cannabis should be legal for all adults.
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There are a lot of reasons for that change, but the biggest may be demographic replacement: Older generations that never had any personal experience with it are being replaced by younger generations accepting of the idea that taking a puff on a joint doesn’t turn you into a heroin addict within a week.
But the Biden administration — perhaps because of the president, who himself was much more of a square than a hippie in the old days — seems deeply uncomfortable even talking about it. In March, the Daily Beast reported that despite the Democratic Party’s wide embrace of more liberal marijuana laws, the administration was still punishing staffers who admitted to recent use, or even asking them to resign.
Then when Biden released his budget plan in May, it proposed to remove a ban on D.C. using tax dollars to fund abortions for low-income women, but keep in place the ban on selling and taxing marijuana in the District.
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When asked, the White House will repeat the position Biden has held since the 2020 campaign: that marijuana should be decriminalized on the federal level so states can make their own decisions about recreational use. It should be moved from Schedule I, which classifies it as “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse,” to Schedule II, where it would still be classified as dangerous but more research could be done on it. While he supports medicinal use, he hasn’t come around on recreational use.
That puts him to the right of most Democrats: In Pew Research Center data, 72 percent of Democrats support legalization for recreational use.
Given the other things Biden is dealing with, it’s hard to get too angry about some foot-dragging on marijuana, particularly when things are moving so quickly in the states. But there’s a model for Biden to finally embrace what is at heart a liberal victory, a model he himself was involved in.
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Back in 2012, then-Vice President Biden endorsed marriage equality on “Meet the Press,” apparently blindsiding President Barack Obama and White House staffers who had been debating exactly how and when Obama should announce his own evolution. The president quickly rushed to agree.
Though it didn’t generate much notice, Kamala D. Harris is the first U.S. vice president to endorse marijuana legalization for recreational use. As a presidential candidate in 2019, she told a radio show, “I did inhale. It was a long time ago. But yes,” adding that she supported legalization because “it gives a lot of people joy and we need more joy.”
Like Biden and marriage equality, she had evolved on the issue over her career; at earlier times, she opposed legalization for recreational use. So perhaps she could guide Biden through his own public evolution and help him finally embrace full legalization.
It’s one of the odd characteristics of the culture war that so many Democrats are so often terrified of being vocal about positions that have the support of clear majorities of the public. But this one ought to be easy. Liberals have already won the debate; the administration just has to act like it.
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