The United States is, undeniably, the leader of the free world. When most people, especially Americans, think of freedom, the first country to enter their thoughts is the United States. With this leadership role comes the responsibility to set an example for the rest of the world, particularly when the United States uses human rights as a bargaining chip when deciding policy about trade relations with other countries. What most Americans do not realize is that the United States� human rights status has slowly but surely degraded over the past century. The United States is not even in the top ten of the United Nation�s Human Freedom Index[1], thanks in great part to the fact that the United States has nearly one million people in prison for consensual (sometimes referred to as victimless) crimes[2]. In order for any country to claim that it is truly free, laws should only be constructed to protect the person and property of non-consenting adults from physical injury. Laws against consensual activities breed real crime, cost hundreds of billions of dollars, corrupt law enforcement, corrupt the justice system, corrupt the government, violate the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and force the United States into a position of patent hypocrisy.

Consensual crimes are most properly defined as any crime in which there is no victim. These kinds of crimes were often referred to as victimless crimes, until, that is, real criminals began to co-opt the word when trying to justify their actions, like robbing a bank or stealing from a large corporation. Clearly, these kinds of crimes are not victimless, but nevertheless, most people still find it hard to separate the two. Consensual crimes actually are victimless. There is nobody to report the crime, since there is nobody who has fallen victim to it. Typically, the victim of a crime is also the individual who reports that crime to the authorities. If a person gets mugged, that person goes to the police. But who reports a crime in which all participants are completely willing and consent to the activity? If a person is utilizing the �services� of a prostitute, for instance, who reports the incident? Unless there is a law enforcement officer watching (or entrapping) the prostitute and or her customer, nobody involved in the crime would claim any grievance. There are many such �crimes� on the law books of most states, including (but certainly not limited to) gambling, drug use, prostitution, many kinds of pornography, adultery, fornication (fooling around with somebody who you are not married to), cohabitation (living with somebody of the opposite sex who you are not married to), polygamy, homosexuality, seat belt and motorcycle helmet requirements, and suicide. The common thread amongst all of these �crimes� is unmistakable; even when all those involved in these activities are consenting adults, one can go to jail for doing them.

Thomas Jefferson once said that �the legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others,�[3] yet the United States government obviously feels it is perfectly legitimate to imprison over 750,000 people who did absolutely no injury to anybody, except on some occasions, themselves. Approximately 3,000,000 people are on parole or probation for consensual crimes, and �more than 4,000,000 people are arrested each year� for participating in consensual activities[4]. Thanks in great part to the prosecution of consensual crimes (especially the war on drugs), the United States has one of the highest per-capita homicide rates in the entire world, as well as one of the highest incarceration rates in the industrialized world. Compared to the Netherlands, a country with very few laws against consensual crimes (which is reflected in their 3^rd place status on the United Nations Human Freedom Index), the United States had 4.5 times the homicide rate per-capita, and over 8 times the incarceration rate[5]. Some might suggest that the cause of the higher crime rate in the United States is due to factors other than the illegality of consensual crimes, but considering that about 50% of all individuals in prison in the United States are there for committing consensual crimes[6], it is hard to support that theory.

Perhaps the single greatest example of the disastrous affects of the prosecution of consensual crimes is the war on drugs. The prohibition of substances such as marijuana, cocaine, heroine, and countless other drugs has done little to curb addiction[7], but has cost the United States about 40 billion dollars a year[8], not to mention the millions of lives ruined (or lost) while fighting this �war�. Making drugs illegal forces their market and their use underground, where it is impossible to regulate, and nearly impossible to help those who abuse these substances. Nobody has ever heard of somebody getting shot over a pack of cigarettes (which, by the way, has directly killed far more people than all illegal drugs combined[9]), but it is all too common to get killed over a gram of cocaine. If cocaine was not illegal, its price would be comparable to caffeine[10] (another popular amphetamine), and addicts would hardly have to kill to raise the funds to sustain their habit. Many drugs are obviously dangerous, and those that choose to take them are risking quite a bit for their high, but making those choices illegal creates a whole slew of new, far more dangerous problems that not only those who make that choice must deal with, but society as a whole must deal with. Abraham Lincoln put it best when he said, �a prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded� it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crime.�[11] The war on drugs is, in reality, a war on personal freedom.

Many attempt to rationalize all of this away by falling back on the notion that if drugs were legalized, drug use would skyrocket, and the problems associated with drugs would skyrocket with them, so criminalization is the better of two evils. There are two problems with this reasoning. First, there is no data which supports the conclusion that drug use would increase if legalized. When the Netherlands began their very tolerant drug policy program, their rate of use increased temporarily, but soon dramatically dropped off, and eventually settled at a rate of use between 2 and 10 times lower than what it was before legalization, depending on the drug in question[12]. The Netherlands isn�t alone in their results either. When the United States ending prohibition in the 1930�s, alcohol use dropped off dramatically, although it remained higher than it was before Prohibition started in the first place[13]. Secondly, the majority of the problems often associated with drugs, such as violent crime and health risks, are not caused by the drugs themselves, but instead by the fact they are illegal. People die from heroine overdoses most often because of impurities in the heroine (which are often added to increase the weight, thereby increasing the sale price), and uncertainty of the proper dosage. The same goes for cocaine and most of the other illegal drugs[14]. If these and all other drugs were legal, they could be regulated by the government, and the dangers of doing these drugs would decrease dramatically. In addition, once legalized, the price would fall and crime related to these drugs would drop off dramatically. Both of these conclusions are supported by the results that the Netherlands has had.

Laws against consensual crimes are often justified under the premise that if something is considered immoral, it should also be illegal. The reasoning goes something like: murder is immoral, and it is illegal, therefore all things that are immoral should also be illegal, or all things illegal are also immoral. The fallacy in this logic is a classic case of non sequitur. Yes, murder is illegal, but it is not illegal because it is immoral. Murder is illegal because a society which condones murder would fall into anarchy, and the act of murder can be prevented legitimately by government because it involves the physical harm of a non-consenting other. Similarly, stealing is typically considered immoral, and it is also illegal, but it is not illegal because it is immoral. The idea of what powers the government legitimately has is outlined clearly in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The 1^st Amendment to the Constitution states that �Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech�� The framers of the Constitution were very careful when crafting this famous document, and were vague when they wanted to be vague and specific when they wanted to be specific. The fact that the 1^st Amendment�s �no law� clause could cover almost any act (since pretty much everything could be treated as �religious� or �speech�), but is very specific about forbidding Congress from making any law respecting those acts, suggests that the framers would be apposed to any laws against consensual activities. This is further supported by the independent writings and speeches of many of the founding fathers. This alone wouldn�t necessarily be enough to abolish these laws, since the founders viewed the Constitution as a �living� document, and that it should be modified (carefully) as the needs of the country changed. But the Constitution (which, again, outlines the legitimate powers of government - sometimes referred to as the law), coupled with the plainly documented detrimental affects of the illegality of consensual activities, provides clear and sound reasoning to justify the disposal of these violations of human rights.

To thoroughly explore the issue of consensual crimes would take many hundreds of pages (692 pages, to be exact), and is beyond the scope of this brief overview. Many of the facts used to criticize the United States� policies come directly from studies funded by the government themselves, and are cataloged brilliantly in Ain�t Nobody�s Business if You Do � the Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in Our Free Country, by Peter McWilliams. The book is available online, for free, at http://www.mcwilliams.com. Tragically, and ironically, Peter McWilliams died in 2000 by choking on his own vomit because a judge would not let him smoke the marijuana he needed to help him keep his cancer medication down. Who Peter McWilliams was hurting when he smoked a joint in the privacy of his own home is beyond reason.

Freedom is not an all or nothing kind of issue. The United States is obviously a far freer country than China, or Cuba, or all but 12 other countries around the world, but the millions of people in the United States who have had their lives dramatically changed, ruined, or destroyed by consensual crime laws don�t care about how much better the United States is than other countries. People must educate themselves about the facts surrounding the many laws they take for granted every day, for �if a nation expects to be ignorant and free� it expects what never was and never will be.�[15]

Works Cited

Bowman, Rebecca. �Jefferson�s Religious Beliefs.� Monticello. Thomas Jefferson �� Foundation. 19 May 2002.
http://www.monticello.org/resources/interests/religion.html

Levine, Harry G., Ph. D. �Has the War on Drugs reduced addiction? � No.� Moyers on Addiction. PBS Online. 19 May 2002.
http://www.thirteen.org/closetohome/viewpoints/html/addict.html

McWilliams, Peter. Ain�t Nobody�s Business if You Do � the Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in Our Free Country. 1996. Prelude Press.

�Punishment and Prejudice: Racial Disparities in the War on Drugs� May 2000. Vol 12, Num 2. Human Rights Watch. 19 May 2002.
http://www.hrw.org/reports/2000/usa/index.htm

Szasc, Thomas. �A Brief History of Drugs�. Cerimonal Chemistry. �� Doubleday/Anchor. Garden City, New York, 1975. 19 May 2002.
http://www.sky.org/data/drughist.html

�The Human Freedom Index�. United Nations Development Programme Report. �� 1991. MIT. 19 May 2002.
http://xenia.media.mit.edu/~kris/FreedomIndex.html

�The Netherlands and the United States.� Drug War Facts. Common Sense for Drug Policy. 19 May 2002.
http://www.drugwarfacts.org/thenethe.htm

White, Larry C. �Cigarettes on Trial: The Public Health Balancing Act� Priorities. ��� 1991. Vol 3, Num 4. American Council on Science and Health. 19 May 2002.
http://www.acsh.org/publications/priorities/0304/cigontrial.html