I was born three score and two years ago in the University of Michigan hospital in Ann Arbor, Michigan. My dad was the Founding Dean of the U of M’s school of Library Science, and I ended up earning three degrees from Michigan. I love Ann Arbor, and in many meaningful ways, that remarkable community will always remain my hometown. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not ever moving back there, because, as it turns out, Ann Arbor is surrounded by Michigan and that state’s horrible winter weather. But I have many fond memories of growing up in Ann Arbor, to include going to many U of M football games, all the way back to the Bo and Woody days.

Which, of course, brings me to mushrooms and other fungi…

A recent AP story, reported in Colorado Politics, noted that the city council of Ann Arbor recently voted to follow Denver’s path by essentially decriminalizing psychedelic plants and the aforementioned fungi. The city leaders voted unanimously to simply stop looking for anyone suspected of planting, crowing, buying, and distributing these plants. Is this a good thing? I think so.

I confess that I do not really have any experience to draw on regarding these substances. I have managed to reach the age of 62 without ever having been drunk or high and having never taken any illegal substance. My experience as a military cop has led me to the conclusion that alcohol is a greater problem than are the more “minor” types of drugs (Meth, heroin, and other “major” drugs are, in my view, a different issue). As a cop, I would rather deal with someone who is smoking marijuana over someone drunk on beer any day of the week. And from my cop perspective, I would also rather not have to deal with chasing down people with mushrooms when there are far more important law enforcement functions to take care of.

Once again, things seem to come down to how wide a libertarian streak you have. I have written nearly 20 columns so far in which the range of libertarian views make an appearance. I do not see Denver’s decision, and now the decision in Ann Arbor, to be so much about decriminalizing a crime as it is about deciding not to try to regulate personal behavior. Frankly, what you do in your own home to your own body is really not my business, absent an impact on the greater society. To borrow an old phrase, as long as you don’t do it in the streets and scare the horses, it isn’t society’s concern (note to the younger readers: Horses are animals people used to ride, and so they’d be tied up outside stores and such).

So where does it end? I do not really expect my somewhat conservative adopted hometown of Colorado Springs to follow suit, though there is a strong libertarian streak here. But should Denver and other communities consider decriminalizing more than just the mushrooms and related fungi? I can almost hear the shouts of the hard-core libertarians yelling “yes!” Many nations around the world have reduced or eliminated restrictions on a variety of drugs. I acknowledge my own hypocrisy on the issue by favoring the legalization of most drugs (so we can regulate, test, and tax them) but I’m not at all sure about the hard core drugs such as the ones like meth and heroin I mentioned before. 

Back when I was growing up in Ann Arbor, a tradition was born that took place on every April 1 — the Hash Bash. On that day, hundreds gathered on the university’s main campus to smoke pot and such. There were lots of drums being badly played and other assorted celebrations of things cannabis. The local cops kind of rolled their eyes and ignored things as long as the celebrants stayed in the main area and didn’t raise too much of a ruckus. The city survived the day and I’m pretty sure the Doritos company did well. 

As with essentially all issues of governance, the question of drug regulation again boils down to the inherent battle in a free society between liberty and order. What rights do people have to enjoy what they want to enjoy and what rights does the society have to restrict behavior that is seen as dangerous and unwise? The experience in Denver, and now starting up in Ann Arbor, suggests that on the issue of at least this type of drug, tilting toward liberty is the better choice.

As Colorado’s experiment with decriminalizing marijuana has shown, a society can regulate such items to promote safety while also raking in buckets of cash in the form of taxes. In what some conservatives may see as ironic, the very market forces they prefer to government regulation suggest that legalization may be the best conservative choice. But until such deregulation takes hold statewide, if you want to enjoy a mushroom, feel free to visit Denver or Ann Abor. They are both lovely towns.