This document will argue the need to legalize illicit street drugs such as heroin and cocaine which are currently prohibited under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. Drug use and abuse will always be a problem in Canada, so government intervention is vital for safe narcotic use. A person who uses or buys drugs causes harm only to himself. By legalizing illicit drugs, violence and crime will decrease massively. Ultimately, the criminal market will be eliminated and deprived of its revenue, which will allow us to regulate and control the market. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayA person who uses drugs only causes harm to himself. By using drugs you are not violating anyone else's life. Since law and philosophy are closely related, I will discuss the most important liberal legal theorist. John Locke believed that all individuals have rights, and those rights include life, liberty, and property. Locke discussed how government was created to preserve these rights and nothing more or less. Locke was talking about rights towards another person, which involved a specific limitation; As long as you don't violate another person's life, you can live your life. For example, marijuana and heroin are fine as long as they belong to you and are for personal use. Actions such as drug use and prostitution are deemed acceptable since it is one's body, but acts such as stealing a car and murder violate another individual's property and physical well-being. Many people consume drugs as they please, who's to say we can deny them that freedom and lifestyle since it doesn't infringe on other people's rights. By prohibiting illicit drugs, we needlessly criminalize millions of otherwise law-abiding citizens. This results in the forced distribution of drugs to unregulated and violent dealers/criminals. Violence and crime would decrease enormously if drugs were legalized. There is no doubt that there is a correlation between prohibition and violence and crime. An unregulated, demand-driven market determines the price of illegal drugs. Currently drugs on the street are very expensive. This means that some addicted users resort to theft to raise funds. Legalization would allow us to regulate the market, set a much lower price, and eliminate the need for users to raise funds through crime and violence. This would result in a liberalization of our legal system and a drastic reduction in the prison population, saving large sums of taxpayer money. Drug dealers would be left in the past and their wages would be minimized, making the job financially unstable. Shootings by drug dealers would be minimal or non-existent. Communities in poverty would unite. Adults and teenagers previously involved in a life of crime would be forced to look for legitimate work. Deaths due to infected needles and poisonous drugs would be eliminated. The billions of dollars claimed by organized crime and drug rings will now go to honest workers. Community gang violence will be reduced, as will the profit margin for cartels smuggling drugs into Canada. By banning drugs we are inflating the profit margins of crime bosses. As long as drugs remain illegal, turf wars and murders will continue because criminals become greedy and want to eliminate the competition with extreme measures. “In 2001, Portugal decriminalized.