Song of the Day 4/20: Peter Tosh, “Legalize It”

Peter Tosh once told an interviewer that ganja would someday be as legal as cigarettes. That’s still years off, but as this handy map shows, in only six U.S. states, all of them deep red, does weed remain entirely illegal. Weigh that against 16 states (17 if you count D.C.) containing 43% of the population where it is fully legal. That includes red states like South Dakota and Alaska. And support is bipartisan — the legalization initiative in Arizona got nearly 300,000 more votes than either Joe Biden or Donald Trump. Polls show two-thirds of Americans support full legalization.

Delaware is one of 12 states that have decriminalized it and legalized medical use but haven’t taken the final step. Neither has the federal government, and you have to wonder if Joe Biden, who’s been a law ‘n’ order guy his entire career, will change that. The business community seems to think he will.

This was the title track to Peter Tosh’s first solo album, released in 1976, a critically lauded debut that showed he wasn’t just a founding member of the Wailers. He never sold many albums in the U.S., but his music and activism helped give Jamaican music a worldwide audience. His life and career were cut short in 1987 when a gang of bandits, led by an ex-con Tosh had befriended, invaded his home demanding money. Tosh and two others were killed.