Drug law reform comes to Mexico

Last month, Mexico’s Supreme Court handed down two decisions that effectively overturned Mexico’s longstanding ban on the personal use of marijuana. The Court affirmed the power of the individual—rather than the state—to decide what to do with their own body. More importantly, it struck down a form of prohibition and brought the “war on drugs” in Mexico closer its end than ever before.

Both of us are plaintiffs in the two cases and, for the past decade, we have worked as drug policy reform advocates who have sought to decriminalize the use of cannabis in Mexico. The Supreme Court had already chipped away at the prohibition of cannabis on three previous occasions between 2015 and 2017. Coupled with its most recent decisions, Mexico’s Supreme Court has created a new precedent, one which lower courts must apply to their rulings.

As a result of these rulings, new criteria must be used by every judge across Mexico for cases concerning drug possession or use. This is no small thing; as recently as 2014, the Attorney General’s Office initiated almost 5,000 preliminary inquiries into “consumption”—and another 4,000 for “possession”—of marijuana, even though these activities are not punishable by law. This change may help reduce mass incarceration in Mexico.