Nor does it explain the original Prohibition, a single paragraph of law that created an explosion of organized crime, reclassified a tremendous percentage of American adults as lawbreakers, and filled prisons.

Prohibition is a timeless, recurring issue. I think it comes from something even more timeless: moral authoritarianism.

The urge felt by many people to force their neighbor to do things the Right Way.

The puritan dream that the world could be clean and harmonious and good if only Those People could be brought to heel.

> The urge felt by many people to force their neighbor to do things the Right Way.

This is an innate aspect of society. See: murder, sexual assault, etc. Morality is a human construct.

The real question is where to draw the line, and the answer isn't immediately clear, even in a court of law.

I do agree with you though that moral conservatism needs to move on from the 1950s.

> This is an innate aspect of society. See: murder, sexual assault, etc

No, those rules are about protecting me from my neighbor. They're perfectly reasonable, both as timeless moral norms and as law.

The problems begin when I want to control my neighbor's behavior in ways that have nothing to do with protection. If I feel the need, for example, to prohibit him from having a gay relationship because it's against my religion. Or telling him that smoking one plant is fine, but if he smokes a different kind of plant I'll call men with guns over to his house to stop him.

That is what I mean by moral authoriarianism.

Every other country (make that government) uses what the US does as an excuse. I remember when the Romanian government banned spontaneous protests by saying, on TV, "even the US requires them to get permits".