Hal Bidlack
You may recall my mentioning, from time to time, for the past 26 years or so I’ve performed a one-man show as Alexander Hamilton around the nation. It’s been great fun and the more I learn about Hamilton, the more I respect him and his intellect.
I mention Hamilton because of a recent Colorado Politics story, regarding upcoming votes by the citizens of Colorado Springs. This November my fellow residents and I will be asked to vote on two different questions regarding recreational marijuana sales. One measure would allow medicinal pot shops to convert to recreational sales, while the other vote is to change the city charter to forever ban recreational pot shops in our fair city.
History teaches us Hamilton had one great blessing, though at the time it didn’t feel like one. He was born outside what would become the United States, and only came to the continent at the age of 16 or so. Thus, when war and later independence came, Hamilton found his loyalty was not for a particular “home state” but rather for the new nation as a whole. Thomas Jefferson once wrote “what a difficult thing it is to be 300 miles from one’s country.” He was in Philadelphia and was talking about Virginia as his country. And Jefferson was not alone in this way of thinking. Many of the challenges in getting the new Constitution ratified centered around lots of the Founding Fathers thinking of their states as their country and not the United States. Hamilton, however, believed your rights as an American should not vary by the accident of the location of your birth.
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This idea came back to mind as I read the CoPo story. You likely know Colorado Springs is a pretty conservative place, with a pretty conservative City Council (though things are getting better, just ask our mayor). Therefore, you won’t be too shocked to learn the council recently voted to send a ballot measure to the voters this fall asking if the city charter should be amended to ban all recreational marijuana sales. This change in the charter would trump any ordinance passed by the voters, such as the one noted above that would allow more recreational pot shops in town.
Herein lies one my many problems with the Republican Party’s view of how things ought to be run. They shout to the rooftops about freedom, but what they really mean is their own freedom to decide what you can and cannot do in your own home. They want to ban you marrying the love of your life if that person happens to be the same sex as you, and they want to restrict what rights a woman has over her own body. And now they want to override any future votes by the people to make marijuana more available. What a buzzkill.
Back when I was a military cop, I dealt with people who were under the influence of alcohol and people who were high on marijuana. Let me assure you I would rather deal with 10 people who were high than one nasty drunk. While folks who are high mostly want to sit and eat chips, drunk folks tend to love you or hate you excessively. But for reasons I don’t fully understand, alcohol is completely legal, while pot is not.
Which brings us back to Hamilton. If you move, say, to Colorado Springs for a job and you find a house in Manitou Springs you love, you might be just down the road from a recreational pot shop. But if you found a home in my neighborhood, you’d live in a town whose council seeks to limit your choices and prevent you from enjoying marijuana in your own home. You can get drunk as a skunk (note: has anyone actually ever seen a drunk skunk?) but you can’t buy the stuff to get a little buzz going for you.
My libertarian streak will guide me a bit on these two ballot measures. I will certainly vote against the City Council charter amendment sneak attack on your and my freedoms, and I’ll vote in favor of the citizen initiative to create more recreational marijuana stores in Colorado Springs. I say this as a guy who has never been drunk and has never been high. I’ve never smoked pot, and I don’t think I ever will. But I don’t think my own abstinence is reason enough to demand others live by my rules.
When Republicans talk about liberty these days, they are talking about the liberty to be Republicans just like them. Will this effort to limit voters’ choices succeed?
Stay tuned.
Hal Bidlack is a retired professor of political science and a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who taught more than 17 years at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.
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Publish date : 2024-08-15 20:00:00
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