Europe Goes To Pot

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Some countries go even further. While dealers can still be arrested, Spain no longer prosecutes users of any recreational drug, including heroin, as long as they do it privately. In actual practice, it's common to see young people sharing a joint outside a club or even injecting drugs in a public square. Whether in spite of or because of the liberal regime, Spanish drug use has dropped over the past decade. Last month Portugal embarked on a similar decriminalization approach. First-time users of any drug are given suspended sentences; the hooked are deemed "patients," who are sent to a special drug-dependency board and offered treatment. If they refuse, they can be fined, sentenced to community service, blacklisted at discos--but not sent to jail. Carlos Rocha, spokesman for the Council of Ministers, says the old law simply "sent more and more persons to prison every year, and prisons became drug markets, drug-addiction nurseries."

Still, plenty of Europeans think decriminalizing marijuana is reefer madness. Even in Holland, 40% of those polled want the sale of soft drugs banned again, and 80% of localities bar the cannabis coffee shops. But advocates of coffee-shop sales think there's a major gain in isolating marijuana users--75% of whom are recreational dabblers, smoking once a week or less--from dealers who peddle harder drugs. "Separating these markets has resulted in less heroin use among young people," says Janhuib Blans from the Jellinek Center in Amsterdam. Today the average age of Dutch heroin addicts is rising steadily and has reached 40; a retirement home for junkies has even been opened. Peter Lilley, former deputy leader of the British Conservative Party, caused a stir recently by backing the sale of cannabis in licensed shops for off-premises consumption, just like liquor. The drug would, like booze, carry health warnings and be taxed. But unlike in Holland, it would be procured legally from licensed growers. He thinks this will hurt drug syndicates and help make dope "simply boring"--the same reasons advanced by Swiss officials for a new law permitting legal production of marijuana for purchase by Swiss residents.

European liberality is unlikely to make a dent in Washington, where President Bush has said drug legalization "would be a social catastrophe." Despite rising numbers of marijuana arrests, the U.S. remains wedded to strict prohibition. But Washington will have to watch out for hemp-scented clouds blowing from north of the border. The Canadian Bar Association, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police all conditionally support decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of pot. So does Joe Clark, a former Prime Minister who is leader of the opposition Conservatives.

It's already a lucrative export: British Columbia's underground marijuana industry employs an estimated 150,000 people and earns some $4 billion a year, sending as much as 95% of the output to the U.S. A recent pot poll shows that 47% of Canadian voters back its legalization. One entrepreneur estimates that will happen in two years; he is already drawing up plans for a string of cafes along the 3,987-mile U.S. border, proffering high-quality weed to go, in vacuum-sealed bags.