of all fatal highway crashes. Marijuana may present similar risks, but at present there are no reliable data on its importance in accidents. According to John Stuart Mill's writings, the government should try to control only the aspects of drug use that injure society. In this vein, it makes sense to have laws against driving under the influence of marijuana similar to those governing driving under the influence of alcohol. In other words, driving while on marijuana should be outlawed by not the use of marijuana itself. Some people believe that marijuana threatens society in a more insidious way. They argue that it drains workers' energy and makes them less productive. This in turn lowers the vitality of the economy, depressing the overall quality of life. In addition, drug use- including marijuana smoking- is seen as a plague on society that must be isolated. This disease theory holds that legalizing marijuana would make it more widely available and that this would tend to increase its use as well as the use of all kinds of drugs. One of the detriments of tolerating drug use, according to this theory, is that is encourages the use of more and different drugs. The National Institute on Drug Abuse;s 1984 report to Congress cited no evidence to support the idea that drug use is hurting economic productivity. It said: "The fact is, very little is known about the complex relationship which undoubtedly exists between drug abuse, worker performance, and productivity, or the lack thereof.... Simply put, the number of unanswered questions currently far outnumbers the available answers." Nor is there any strong evidence that legalizing marijuana would increase use of the drug. In fact, there is some evidence suggesting that drug use under a relaxed legal system might not increase at all. Many states have removed the penalties for marijuana possession that were on the books in the 1950s and 1960s. The change occurred during a reform movement tha...
