America's war on drugs failed, so Oregon is daring to decriminalise

Portland, Oregon. The state is aiming to give people caught with harder drugs a second chance. Photo / 123RF

Jesce Horton was 18 when first arrested for carrying two grams of cannabis.

A star engineering student who had grown up in the shadow of his father's own weed conviction, he had found that the drug unlocked his talent for maths.

That arrest was the first of three that would cost him his scholarship, force him to drop out for a time and block a promotion at his dream job.

"It had a great effect on my future and my self-esteem," he says. "You see a lot of your doors close."

But Horton persevered, and today runs a legal cannabis business called Lowd in Portland, Oregon, which had been the first state in the US to end criminal penalties for possession of the drug in 1973.

His course exemplifies how cannabis has left the shadows of America's drug war to become a legitimate business.

Now Oregon is aiming to give people caught with harder drugs a second chance.

As of tomorrow, the possession of small amounts of heroin, cocaine, meth and other controlled drugs for personal use will not be a crime in Oregon. Instead it will be a civil offence, punishable by a US$100 fine that can be waived for a health assessment.

Those cited will be referred to "addiction recovery centres", funded from new tax revenue generated by legal weed businesses. The system is loosely based on Portugal's decriminalisation in 2001.

Separately, 'magic mushrooms' are set to be legalised for medicine and therapy in two years' time.

These measures, backed by 58 per cent and 56 per cent of Oregon voters in referendums, make Oregon's drug laws the most radical in the US, and could augur yet more change.

With the Democratic Party in control of government, advocates hope for an end to the "war on drugs" first declared in 1971.

Oregon was the first US state to decriminalise cannabis. Now the possession of small amounts of heroin, cocaine, meth and other drugs will no longer be a crime in the state. Photo / 123RF

According to Anthony Johnson, at the Oregon Retailers of Cannabis Association, drug possession arrests will drop by about 1,000 per year. Black and native Americans are likely to benefit most, with predictions that racial disparities in drug arrests will fall by 95 per cent.

The change is a double-edged sword to Roy Moore, a gang outreach supervisor with Portland's violence prevention officer.

"On social media, the joke is 'oh yeah, I can walk around with this [drug] now, homie, and I won't go to jail," he says. In other ways, his job will be easier, letting him offer help more openly without the threat of incarceration looming.

The rollout so far has been chaotic, with battles over funding and organising looming in Oregon's state capitol, Salem. Mike Marshall, head of the recovery groups' coalition Oregon Recovers, fears the lack of addiction services reform could cost lives, and will push for new taxes on alcohol to fund a holistic public health plan.

Meanwhile, there is excitement about the availability of medical psilocybin, the active ingredient in hallucinogens like magic mushrooms.

"This will provide opportunities to conduct research that was not possible," says Aaron Eisen, at the Portland Psychedelic Society. While cautioning that psychedelics do carry risks, he cites studies suggesting that they could help with conditions ranging from anxiety and depression to chronic pain to addictions.

"One day we may see therapy centres offering MDMA and psilocybin therapy for mental disorders," he says.

Advocates are excited about the medical potential of legalising hallucinogens like magic mushrooms. Photo / 123RF

The question now is whether other states will follow. November saw votes to legalise cannabis not only in liberal New Jersey but traditionally red Arizona, Montana and South Dakota, plus medical use in Mississippi. Five states have now legalised marijuana, with 36 others approving medical use.

Shane Schmitt, at the cannabis growing firm Wy'East Oregon Gardens, sees change from an unexpected source: baby boomers are a growing pot-buying demographic, and prefer trustworthy, mellow highs with labelled ingredients.

Johnson believes further decriminalisation will follow, with federal decriminalisation of all drugs inside ten or 20 years.

Pushback has already begun. In Idaho, a red state surrounded by legal weed, Republican legislators are touting a constitutional amendment to ban future drug referendums, reportedly fearing big-money campaigns funded by out of state interests.

In the long run, liberal drug laws could also help reverse the mass incarceration and military-style policing that exploded last summer in the George Floyd protests. The threat of tooled-up drug gangs justified warlike SWAT teams.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have had evolving views on the American drug war. Photo / AP

Back then, one of the drug war's biggest allies in Congress was Joe Biden, and Vice President Kamala Harris made "tough on crime" a centre of her early career.

These days both promise to decriminalise cannabis at the federal level and leave the rest to states. Democrats in the House of Representatives have voted for the same, and might have more success now their colleagues control the Senate.

Biden's nominee for health secretary is Xavier Becarra, the former attorney general of California who oversaw its first legal pot sales, while his pick for commerce secretary, Rhode Island governor Gina Raimondo, included plans for state-run weed shops in her 2021 budget.

Ironically, Roy Moore believes that Biden's past support for the drug war makes him more likely to reject it, because of how it forced him to confront Democrats' anger.

"His base lies in people who are expecting change. He has enough around him to hold him accountable."