> Don't know if there was any legal technicallity behind it, but it was (is) as legal as you can get. It was not legal. They practice gedoogbeleid ("tolerance"

> Don't know if there was any legal technicallity behind it, but it was (is) as legal as you can get. It was not legal. They practice gedoogbeleid ("tolerance"). They agree that it is illegal but prosecutors rarely enforce the law, because they prioritize other crimes instead. In that sense, marijuana has been "legal" in Oakland's Measure Z clubs for a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oaksterdam,_Oakland#Measure_Z_clubs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oaksterdam,_Oakland#Measure_Z_... In both cases, sale to customers is tolerated, but sale to the coffeeshops (and growth/production) is illegal. Because wholesale growth and production are illegal, this setup lacks a key benefit of legalization: cutting off a major source of cash to organized crime syndicates and drug cartels. (This is the exact reason that the former president of Mexico, Vincente Fox, now supports legalization). Furthermore, in the Netherlands, coffeeshops have been dwindling in number in recent years, due to crackdowns, zoning regulations (oftentimes targeted at coffeeshops specifically), and other laws/policies that restrict the degree of "safe harbor" that such coffeshops have. (There was recently a proposal to ban sale to tourists; I believe it was due to go into effect recently, though it may have been delayed or reversed). As long as these businesses are forced to operate in a legal grey area (whether in the Netherlands or in the US), they cannot demonstrate the true potential of legalization.