This is an ethics quiz because I recognize that I am irretrievably biased on the question of marijuana (no, I really don’t care that I’m supposed to call it “cannabis” now: bite me), which I believe should continue to be illegal, though I am under no illusions that this metaphorical horse has left the barn for good.
Maryland’s governor Wes Moore signed an executive order yesterday that pardons more than 175,000 convicted drug-abusers whose crimes were related to marijuana use. Moore said he did this “with deep pride and soberness.”
Yes, he’s proud to announce that Maryland doesn’t think violating laws is anything anyone should be ashamed of.
“Today is about equity; it is about racial justice,” Anthony Brown, Maryland’s attorney general, said. “While the order applies to all who meet its criteria, the impact is a triumphant victory for African Americans and other Marylanders of color who were disproportionately arrested, convicted and sentenced for actions yesterday that are lawful today.” This is because a disproportionate number of blacks broke the pot laws. This in turn acculturated many of them into breaking other laws with impunity as well. The progressive rule is that if laws are violated by larger numbers of a minority group than their demographic presence in the population would predict, it is discriminatory to enforce those laws.
I wonder who thought up that dodge? Whoever he or she is, it’s brilliant.
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…
Is the Maryland pardon fair and responsible?
Apparently no one is currently serving prison time in Maryland for misdemeanor marijuana offenses alone, so the new executive order won’t directly free anybody. People convicted of both felony and misdemeanor charges will continue to serve their felony sentences even if the pardon has forgiven their misdemeanors. Well, that’s something, anyway. The pardon still undermines the rule of law and the essential societal principle that just because you disagree with a law, or because it is inconvenient to obey, it or because you wish it didn’t exist, your duty as a citizen is to follow the law until it is changed. The Marylanders being pardoned were convicted for breaking the law. Breaking any law is wrong, and a responsible government must continue to send that message.
The mantra being repeated to justify this action is that the crime being pardoned is no longer illegal. The Constitution prevents the government from retroactively criminalizing someone’s conduct that was legal when they engaged in it. The reverse principle should also be true: the illegality of your actions before a law was changed or repealed is set and in the books. If you broke it intentionally as civil disobedience, you should be held to your commitment.
As I said, however, I have opposed marijuana use my whole life, and am biased on the matter. Maybe you can see the issue more clearly through all the smoke.
Ethics Alarms 
I am in favor of legalization, and would argue that laws against possession and use are unconstitutional at the federal level. They needed an amendment for prohibition, and actually needed one for prohibition 2.0 even though the didn’t both with one. I take issue with MOST government agencies. The state could have power to restrict drugs under it’s state constitution however, so that may not apply in this case. This basically describes my bias going in.
Then there’s the pesky issue of defining felony ever downward.
That being said, the pardon as presented is overbroad. “Related to” is such a broad term. I’d be happier if it just commuted their sentences, without the option to expunge their record. Expunging is effectively rewriting history, which I also have a bias against.
Not being pedantic, but merely pointing out that the two types of confinement are vastly different, In my state and all others that I’m familiar with, misdemeanants serve their time (less than a year) in a county jail rather than a state prison. Many of those misdemeanants actually committed felonies that were pled down to misdemeanors. Many of those misdemeanor sentences are served totally or partially on probation. Many a drug dealer has pled to misdemeanor possession charges. In my county, virtually no one does jail time for simple possession unless it is a third or fourth offense.I fear that the societal problems resulting from legalized marijuana will eventually equal or exceed the problems we have with alcohol. Nonetheless, if it is truly the will of the people that marijuana be legalized, the the people will have to bear the cost. That has no bearing on the sentence of those already convicted. As the old TV show “Baretta” star used to say, “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.”
“And that’s the name of THAT tune.”
unless it’s civil disobedience with willingness to accept consequences of course.
As one who does believe in law and order, the law for the law’s sake fatigues me and I have no interest in supporting the notion that I should follow a law because it exists. If I smoke, and it is illegal, I harm no one. I do not exist for the purpose of the state and I do not exist for the life long purpose of resisting every overburdensome law that exists thorough some all consuming political process to get a law changed… Sensible legislation would solve many laws and prevent many others.
If I recognize that I penalized others out of my ignorance and fear, how can I right past wrongs? Does the unethicality of the law breaking of someone in the past prohibit me from nullifying their guilt when I realize that I was wrong for the law, and subsequent prosecution and conviction?
I am glad to see we agree on the ex post facto aspect of this. A act committed in 1960 that was then a crime is no less a crime today.
The literature is abound with evidence that marijuana use is detrimental to unborn children, the mental development of the adolescent, and the productive output of the adult. So says, the esteemed institutions of the CDC, FDA, American pediatrics, and psychiatrists. This has been true for decades. Romanticizing the use of marijuana by the entertainment industry and legalizing it for “medicinal purposes” has not change the pharmoco-dynamics.
We continue down the trail where science is called to be trusted in some areas and disregarded in others, dependent upon one’s subjective ideology.
I’ve never used marijuana myself and have some bias against it, although many people I respect have used it.
That said, one opposing perspective here is the idea that the laws against marijuana were unjust, not only because they violated people’s right to temporarily intoxicate themselves (if there is such a right; the repeal of prohibition arguably means the U.S. recognizes one), but because marijuana laws were at least in part designed to criminalize and punish African-Americans while superficially appearing racially impartial, as the users of marijuana tended towards those demographics at the time. That’s why marijuana use was punished more harshly than the drug’s effects would suggest.
Under the philosophy that an unjust law is no law at all, pardoning people for marijuana convictions could be seen as no different than pardoning people for sodomy, or for defying censorship on politically dissenting speech.
If the pardon is framed as part of correcting the injustices from an unjust law, I think it could be ethical.
That said, one opposing perspective here is the idea that the laws against marijuana were unjust, not only because they violated people’s right to temporarily intoxicate themselves (if there is such a right; the repeal of prohibition arguably means the U.S. recognizes one), but because marijuana laws were at least in part designed to criminalize and punish African-Americans while superficially appearing racially impartial, as the users of marijuana tended towards those demographics at the time.
I am moderately sympathetic to this view, but would point out that in other jurisdictions (like Canada), cannabis use was illegal for a while despite us not having the same racial and cultural baggage as is being described. So I think you can criminalize these products for reasons outside of racism, but I’m not sure that you can criminalize them to the extent America has without some.
We’ve had this discussion before… There’s a disconnect in America between reality and perception when it comes to Americans and rights. America likes to say that it’s the Land of The Free… But the reality is that you ban products enjoyed by the rest of the world because you’re afraid a kid might choke on it (Kinder Surprises are attributed to 9 deaths globally, ever), your approval mechanisms are a joke (Saskatoon berries are in fact food), and your threshold for both what a crime is, and what lands you in prison are disturbingly low.
Worse, I think, is that the people talking about how necessary for the American Experiment the Rebel Soul is are often among the first to justify the cultural status quo of incarceration by telling us that “If they didn’t want to go to jail, they shouldn’t have broken the law”, refusing to naysay their sacred cows with questions like “Should the action be illegal?” and “Would a fine suffice for something like this?”, holding on to the absurd like the point of the exercise is to keep as many people in jail for as long as possible, less the Land of the Free experience some Freedom.
Some Americans have misappropriated “Justice” to mean some very unjust things. Maryland’s Pardons are actual justice.
Although African Americans use of pot is about equal (some studies show slightly more, some show slightly less), they are almost four times more likely to be prosecuted. I am all for enforcing the law, but not if it is not enforced equitably. Which is the reason I’m also against the death penalty.
Jan, I’ve watched WAY too many “The First Forty-Eight” episodes. But I would say the vast, vast majority of the episodes involve murders committed during pot deals gone bad. The participants are almost always African American. I think dealing “weed,” as the people on the street seem to prefer to call it, is a basic African American career path. I’d also say ripping off your neighborhood weed dealer is a popular pastime, verging on the recreational. And of course, all these guys carry. And yes, I’m guessing many of the dealers’ customers are white and are more than happy to leave the dealing to the African American guys, which is nasty. Of course, with legalization, the street dealers are going to be put out of business. There will doubtless be reparations to be paid to the street dealers who no longer have a business. That will be white supremacy.
The idea that the usage rate is the same is probably false. The studies that claimed it chose students at the same college, so the sample is not representative. Beyond that, there’s the confounding fact that answering yes to a poll about a crime requires you to trust the system not to use that fact against you. They never accounted for the confounding fact that blacks have less trust in the system. Although that correlation was also gained via a survey, so maybe it’s wrong.
If the pardon removes an impediment to legitimate employment and such employment to that individual such that other criminal activities cease then I can say the societal benefit of the pardon is greater than the costs of maintaining a Scarlett letter on one’s metaphorical forehead and thus be ethical.
My Jeremy Bentham take is that it can only be ethical if the benefits of the pardon accrue to both the individual and society as a whole.
Keep in mind it remains a federal crime irrespective of state laws
Jeremy was right. And promoting consciousness-impairing drugs that are psychologically addictive and devastating to children, the poor, the not-too-bright, social interactions and the workplace, which is what is happening when the government declares, “Hey, we were so wrong! This is fine and dandy to do! Toke up!” does not benefit society. At all.