[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5582]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          MARIJUANA V. HEROIN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Tennessee (Mr. Cohen) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, today on our calendar we have got about 10 
bills dealing with a very serious issue in America: opioids and heroin. 
This is an awful problem we have in our Nation. There is more and more 
use of opioids and heroin and death resulting from it than at any time 
that I can recall in the past.
  I had a young friend a few years back who died of a heroin overdose. 
I have known of other promising young people in Memphis who have died 
of heroin overdoses. This is a problem all over the country, but 
predominantly in the northeast and predominantly in Caucasian areas. It 
has become an issue, as it should, of importance. But none of the bills 
that we are going to deal with today--all of which are good, and all of 
which I will support--deal with the real problem; and that is, the 
recognition in our country that we treat all drugs as a law enforcement 
problem, a criminal problem, and not as a health problem; and that we 
treat most all drugs on the same level and give law enforcement the 
same incentives to arrest dealers and/or users for any drug and not 
encourage them and give them reasons--besides public safety--to 
emphasize their enforcement on opioids and heroin.
  In the drug schedules which we have in our country that lay out the 
order in which we think drugs are the most serious, Schedule I is at 
the top; and in that classification are heroin, LSD, ecstasy, and 
marijuana.
  I ask you each not to answer reflexively which of those four don't 
fit. Marijuana does not fit.
  Our laws should show that heroin is a serious problem and that 
marijuana is not as serious a problem; that users should be dealt with 
in ways that don't put them in jail and, in the case of marijuana 
possession, don't cause them to lose scholarship opportunities, housing 
opportunities in Federal facilities, or jobs later on.
  We also shouldn't have law enforcement, through asset forfeiture, get 
moneys from people they arrest; fund their activities by making 
arrests; and have it be presumed in law that moneys and/or properties 
that are involved in the transactions of those drug deals are involved 
and that law enforcement gets to keep those items. It gives law 
enforcement a reason to go after marijuana--which is easier to find and 
make money--rather than heroin.
  We need to study marijuana to see what its medical uses are. We don't 
need to use it to incarcerate and cripple for the future jobs for young 
people. We need to encourage young people not to do any drugs at all, 
not to do alcohol, not to smoke cigarettes, and to take their time as 
youths to be youths, to be young, to learn, and to fill their minds 
with knowledge for a better life later. But if, as a youth or as an 
adult, they should use an illegal substance, they should be dealt with 
as having a problem and not be given a scarlet letter that stays with 
them for the rest of their lives.
  So my work has been and will continue to be to try to make more sense 
of our drug laws; to see that the scheduling is smarter, that heroin 
and opioids continue to be at the top, and that marijuana is not in 
that listing; and to do things that encourage law enforcement to arrest 
people that are dealing in and selling heroin and opioids, which cause 
death and cause people to be addicted to the point where they will 
commit crimes to secure moneys to keep their habit going, and to not 
have equal incentives to go after marijuana that does none of those 
things.

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