hysical dependence has been demonstrated in subjects who ingested an amount of marijuana equaling 10-20 joints per day. When discontinued, subjects experienced various withdrawal symptoms - loss of appetite, weight loss, sleep disturbances, irritability, sweating and stomach upset. Users often take extraordinary measures, sometimes harmful, to continue using drugs. However this has not been unarguably proven in the case of occasional marijuana use. With other drugs, users will often drop out of school, steal, leave their families, go to jail, and lose their jobs in order to keep using their drug. If forced to quit using, they will undergo painful physical or mental distress. Again, in the case of marijuana, this has not been adequately proven. Thus, the argument has developed from the occasional, recreational user, that it is unjust to have drugs as harmful as alcohol and tobacco have been proven to be, legal to purchase for adult Americans, while at the same time continuing to keep marijuana illegal, by keeping it grouped within the same classification as the much more dangerous narcotics. MARIJUANA AND THE LAW: The use of marijuana in the United States initially became a matter of public concern in the 1930's. Regulatory laws were passed and criminal penalties were instituted for possession or sale of the botanical drug in 1937. By far, one of the strongest advocates for marijuana criminalization was Harry Anslinger. He wrote many extremist anti-marijuana articles and had many gory photos of ax murder victims and the like, published for all America to see that these were the things which marijuana caused people to do under its influence. As Secretary of the Federal Narcotics Control Board's Prohibition Unit, Anslinger had looked somewhat into the cannabis problem. He became the first Commissioner of the Bureau of Narcotics in 1930, an appointment which some commentators feel was made through connections to his uncle-in-law, Andrew Mel...
