October 5, 2016 | Alice Salles
Data
published recently by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) — and sourced from a variety of organizations — shows recreational marijuana ballot initiatives are trending favorably among voters in most states.
In every state where recreational marijuana is on the ballot this November, the
Washington Post’s marijuana policy reporter, Christopher Ingraham,
notes,
“[m]arijuana legalization is leading.” This isn’t a surprise considering the legal marijuana industry
has been growing substantially, becoming one of the fastest burgeoning industries in America.
According to the poll, 50 percent of respondents in Arizona view recreational marijuana legalization favorably, while 60 percent in California do. Fifty-three percent of voters in Maine and Massachusetts and about 57 percent in Nevada also agree that legalizing recreational pot in their states would be a positive development.
Data compiled in the NORML report was drawn from several different sources, such as the
Arizona Republic/Morrison/Cronkite News poll,
The Public Policy Institute of California’s September 2016 survey, the
Portland Press Herald,
Suffolk University, and
WBZ-TV,WBZ NewsRadio, and UMass Amherst.
According to
NORML, out of the “
13 … ballot initiatives [hoping] to either legalize adult marijuana use or to legalize the use of medical marijuana for qualifying medical conditions,” ten have qualified for the November 2016 electoral ballot. If all initiatives pass by popular vote, the country could “
double the number of states that allow the recreational use of marijuana and could potentially expand the therapeutic benefits of marijuana use to millions of Americans".