Texans, cast your votes

    The latest poll, conducted in Feb. 2014, by the University of Texas and Texas Tribune revealed that 49 percent of Texans would legalize marijuana for any purpose, 28 percent would legalize strictly for medical use, and only 23 percent believed that marijuana should remain illegal altogether.  It is clear that public opinion is shifting in favor of legalization.  The Marijuana Policy Project, which played a major role in Colorado's vote to legalize marijuana, has come to Texas and, according to an article in The Austin Chronicle, committed to invest $200,000 per year until the job is done.  

    State policies are usually slow to follow public opinion, especially in Texas, but with numbers like these it's easy to see that it's just a matter of time before marijuana will be legalized in Texas.

    Texas is known for having a very low voter turnout.  Many Texans are both uninformed and uninterested in Texas politics. This is only compounded by the substantial lack of voting by younger generations.  Many of those who are interested in seeing marijuana legalized have not made an effort to vote for lawmakers that are also interested in making that happen.  These factors will certainly contribute to any new laws being a few years behind public opinion.

    So what is the moral of all this?  Change is on the way, but it's on a very slow moving train.  If you want to see marijuana legalized it's up to you to make sure you're registered, find out who is pro-legalization, and cast your votes.