U.S. Marijuana Legalization And Civil Disobedience: Is It Ever Good To Break Federal/State Weed Laws?

As marijuana legalization sweeps through the United States, some believe it is their obligation to act in civil disobedience by smoking weed for recreational purposes. Some say smoking pot against the law is wrong, while others argue the unjust results of these laws provide a moral obligation for change. But do recreational purposes provide an imperative for breaking state and federal marijuana laws?

In a related report by the Inquisitr, a new form of weaponized marijuana gives a new meaning to killer weed.

Consuming marijuana is not immoral in of itself, but breaking the law certainly is. Rather than break current marijuana laws, some say it is best to petition the government for change instead of just grumbling and breaking the law in protest. But the related issues of unjust laws and civil disobedience has long plagued humanity for centuries, as this quote from Henry David Thoreau shows.

“Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse.”

Martin Luther King, Jr., famously said that “everyone has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws,” but MLK Jr. also said, “In any civilized society, it is every citizen’s responsibility to obey just laws.” It can be argued that consuming recreational marijuana is not a necessity, nor is it a right, which means the act of civil disobedience is not a necessity borne out of basic rights being trampled upon by the government.

Even Edward Snowden has touched upon this issue earlier in the year.

“When we look back on history, the progress of Western civilization and human rights is actually founded on the violation of law,” Snowden wrote on Reddit. “America was of course born out of a violent revolution that was an outrageous treason against the crown and established order of the day. History shows that the righting of historical wrongs is often born from acts of unrepentant criminality. Slavery. The protection of persecuted Jews. But even on less extremist topics, we can find similar examples. How about the prohibition of… marijuana?”

The case of medical marijuana may be considered separately from recreational usage. There are many stories of children who suffer from terrible epileptic attacks unless they are given medical marijuana. I personally knew a friend who died from cancer, and smoking weed was the only way she could get her body to settle down to the point where she could eat any food.

This is where the act of civil disobedience really becomes an issue. How is it just to deny help for someone truly suffering? Consuming marijuana may not treat the underlying medical problem, but studies seem to bear out the belief that the symptoms can be alleviated. Thus, in the case of medical issues, should existing marijuana laws be considered unjust laws where civil disobedience is justified?

There, of course, is the legally gray areas where state and Federal marijuana laws conflict. People will argue over how the Tenth Amendment in the Bill of Rights should be interpreted. In the end, in the case of recreational marijuana, there seems to be ample justification to petition the government for change to the law, but not the moral obligation to disobey an unjust law. But medical marijuana may be the exception.

What do you think?