Libertarians generally favor relaxing criminal laws. They want to eliminate capital punishment (which deters violent crime). They are pro-choice on abortion. They want to decriminalize sex work of all kinds. And they want to decriminalize highly-addictive hard drugs. Let’s take a look at that last one and see if it’s produced results.
Here’s Reason magazine writing in August 2021. They are far left / libertarian on social issues:
In 1973, Oregon became the first state to decriminalize marijuana use, setting in motion a movement that has unraveled much of the disastrous U.S. drug war—with far-reaching consequences.
Today, Oregon is once again at the vanguard of reform: In February, it enacted Measure 110, a law ending prison and jail sentences for all types of drug use and possession, whether it be cocaine, meth, heroin, or psychedelics.
[…]Haven Wheelock, who runs a needle exchange in Portland called Outside In, says delaying decriminalization would have been morally unacceptable.
[…]Wheelock says that even if Oregon’s decriminalization gets off to a bumpy start, in no small part because the pandemic has exacerbated substance abuse problems nationwide, that Oregon voters have made the right choice.
“I think we’re going to see systems improve. I think we’re going to see people have access to care that they currently don’t have access to. I think we’re going to see less people getting saddled with convictions that harm them for the rest of their lives. And to me, all of that is a win,” says Wheelock.
And, here is the Cato Institute, a libertarian advocacy group, crowing happily about legalizing hard drugs:
In November 2020, Oregon voters passed Measure 110, which decriminalized the possession for personal use of small amounts of all drugs, including cocaine, heroin, LSD, methamphetamine, and oxycodone. Oregon is the only U.S. state to have implemented this policy.
[…]The problem, however, is that 110 did not go far enough.
While 110 eliminated serious penalties for personal use, it did not legalize production and sale of drugs.
When you make something legal, more people use it. And that’s exactly what happened.
Libertarians seem to think that when you legalize something addictive, then no one will commit any crimes to feed their addictions. Of course people will be able to keep their jobs with a cocaine addiction. And OF COURSE cocaine addicts will be able to make enough money legally from that job to support their habit. Libertarians think that crime will go down, because people with addictions can just work at their white collar jobs, and pay for their cocaine. No problem.
So, what happened next? Something that was a great surprise to libertarians.
The far-left The Atlantic noted:
But three years later, with rising overdoses and delays in treatment funding, even some of the measure’s supporters now believe that the policy needs to be changed. In a nonpartisan statewide poll earlier this year, more than 60 percent of respondents blamed Measure 110 for making drug addiction, homelessness, and crime worse. A majority, including a majority of Democrats, said they supported bringing back criminal penalties for drug possession.
Libertarians like to point to Portugal as a model for successful drug decriminalization, but again it’s just wishing and hoping.
The far-left Washington Post explains:
Portugal decriminalized all drug use, including marijuana, cocaine and heroin, in an experiment that inspired similar efforts elsewhere, but now police are blaming a spike in the number of people who use drugs for a rise in crime. In one neighborhood, state-issued paraphernalia — powder-blue syringe caps, packets of citric acid for diluting heroin — litters sidewalks outside an elementary school.
[…]A newly released national survey suggests the percent of adults who have used illicit drugs increased to 12.8 percent in 2022, up from 7.8 in 2001, though still below European averages. Portugal’s prevalence of high-risk opioid use is higher than Germany’s, but lower than that of France and Italy. But even proponents of decriminalization here admit that something is going wrong.
Overdose rates have hit 12-year highs and almost doubled in Lisbon from 2019 to 2023. Sewage samples in Lisbon show cocaine and ketamine detection is now among the highest in Europe, with elevated weekend rates suggesting party-heavy usage. In Porto, the collection of drug-related debris from city streets surged 24 percent between 2021 and 2022, with this year on track to far outpace the last. Crime — including robbery in public spaces — spiked 14 percent from 2021 to 2022, a rise police blame partly on increased drug use.
Going back to Oregon, the article also notes that “overdoses this year in Portland, the state’s largest city, have surged 46 percent.”
I think that libertarians are great on fiscal policy. But I don’t think we need to listen to them on social policy. Or on foreign policy, but that’s for another post.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
As a pro-life, pro-capital punishment libertarian, I feel compelled to point out that neither being pro-choice or against capital punishment are necessitated by being a libertarian. If abortion ends a human life (and it does) then abortion is a violation of the NAP and all libertarians should be against this. At the same time, no libertarian should believe that tax dollars should be used to pay for a convicted serial killer to have a roof over his head and 3 meals a day for the next 60+ years (this is situation dependent of course, but the point is that if the punishment fits the crime, nothing about being a libertarian necessitates being against the death penalty).
As to the point about the practical consequences of ending the war on drugs, I’ll not push back on the empirical data, but rather ask everyone reading to consider the underlying premise of the war on drugs, namely that it is the right and proper function of government to tell you what you can and can’t do because they know what’s better for you than you do. This may sound great when we’re talking about reducing drug overdoses, but if you accept this premise, it’s only a matter of time before the weapon is turned against you.
Being a libertarian does not mean you endorse using drugs. Some may, but I for one think that doing drugs is stupid and leads to negative consequences (as WK has shown in his article). However, while I think it is my duty to warn others about the dangers of using drugs, I don’t think I have the right to forcibly stop others from using drugs unless I can prove how I am personally being victimized by their drug usage.
If a person legally uses dangerous, addictive drugs and then OD’s, this is tragic, but it’s also not my responsibility to fix. Play stupid games, and you win stupid prizes. Private businesses and establishments still have the right to ban drug usage by their employees or on their property if they so choose, and if drug usage is leading to them losing business, there is no doubt that they will do so.
On the other hand, if a person uses dangerous drugs and then gets behind the wheel of a car, they are now putting other people’s lives in danger and thus, there is just grounds to use force to stop them. The key differentiating factor here is identifying who is being victimized other than the person using drugs.
Consider now what happens when politicians come to power who believe that reading the Bible is a dangerous, extremist activity and that the Bible should be banned for the good of all members of society (this isn’t far off from the world we’re living in, especially in places like Canada). If you accept the premise that the government has the right to restrict personal liberties because they know what’s better for you than you do, how are you going to argue against this?
You can argue that the Bible isn’t harmful, but again, by advocating for the criminalization of drugs, you’ve already accepted that individuals should not be allowed to decide for themselves what is and isn’t harmful. This is reserved for the government to decide, and dissidents can justly be compelled to obey by force. I would contend that as in the case of drug usage, the burden of proof is on the person seeking to make the Bible illegal to prove how they are being personally victimized by another person reading the Bible.
As a final point, though I know Wintery Knight and I disagree on this issue, I still have a great deal of respect for him, and appreciate his input.
Keep up the great work WK!
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You are so great. I know that libertarians disagree a lot on this. I try to go off of the Libertarian Party platform, and what I see in Reason and Cato.
My worry about being permissive on definition of marriage and drugs is how it will affect the little children. They don’t get a mom and a dad, or they grow up with addict parents who have to commit crimes to feed the habit. I think that if libertarianism undermines natural marriage and causes unemployment / turning to crime (to feed drug addiction habits) then it is bad for kids who grow up in those environments. Children don’t get to consent to the behavior of their parents, that’s the concern I have.
So, I do think that the government has a role in things like protecting the unborn, capital punishment, defining and promoting marriage, and banning addictive drugs that are likely to cause people to lose their jobs and turn to crime.
It would be great if there was a libertarian country that people could go to and then test out all these ideas.
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I have always felt that they are on the wrong discussion with drugs. If they want to discuss lowering legal penalties for drugs, or if it is legal to allow more options for sentencing, I would have less of an issue.
But to make them fully legal is silly.
Also no one is required to pay for drugs or needles and supplies on the tax payer dime. Those programs should be scaled back or eliminated because you would have to look a long time to find one that could be called remotely successful
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