Four new states legalized the consumption of recreational marijuana at the ballot box last week, bringing the total states with some form of legalized cannabis to 36 in the country. Federally, the sale and consumption of weed is still illegal despite a growing consensus among Americans that the drug should be legalized nationally.
In an ongoing yearly survey from Gallup, a record-high 68 percent of U.S. adults said they were in favor of legalizing marijuana. That’s grown steadily by over 20 percentage points in the last decade, coinciding with more and more states passing ballot initiatives in favor of legal weed.
Medical marijuana has gained far more traction than recreational over the last two decades. Since California passed the first medical marijuana bill in 1996, a large majority of states across the country have followed suit to allow for the sale, possession and consumption of medical marijuana to specially licensed people. The legalization of recreational weed is a new growing trend among states, with Colorado and Washington becoming the first to do so in 2012. While only a few other states have fully legalized weed’s recreational use, many others have decriminalized the drug and legalized the less-potent recreational use of the similar cannabidiol.
This chart shows the percentage of U.S. adults who think marijuana should be made legal.
