For the past decade, a huge gap has separated the marijuana policies Americans want from the ones the federal government enforces. Few issues exist on which the gap has been wider and more consistent. That’s the way democracy is supposed to work: In politics as in show business, “give the people what they want” is a pretty reliable guide to success. There’s little doubt the change will be popular: Polls show that roughly 70% of Americans favor making marijuana legal.
S. Sentencing Commission found that federal prosecutions for simple possession of marijuana fell from 2,172 in fiscal year 2014 to just 145 in fiscal year 2021. In recent months, the Justice Department has dropped some long-running prosecutions that dated from an earlier era of enforcement. Back when President Nixon proposed what became the Controlled Substances Act, just 12% of American adults supported legal marijuana, according to Gallup’s long-running polling on the question.