Marijuana use reached a record high in new polling, as for the first time more Americans said they smoke marijuana than reported smoking cigarettes in the last week.
Sixteen percent of Americans in a new Gallup poll reported smoking marijuana, up from 12 percent last year and more than double the all-time low of 7 percent.
Fewer Americans, at 11 percent, reported smoking cigarettes in the past week, down from 16 percent last year and a far fall from a peak at 45 percent in the 1950s.
It’s the highest percentage of reported marijuana use and the lowest percentage of past-week cigarette use since Gallup started asking those questions in 2013 and 1944, respectively.
Nearly half of U.S. adults now report having tried marijuana, up from 4 percent when Gallup first surveyed about its use in 1969.
Despite increasingly common use of the drug, Americans remain evenly split on whether marijuana is having a negative or positive effect on society.
Yet more than two-thirds of Americans, at 68 percent, think the drug should be legal, a record-high maintained from last year’s polling.
Six states could vote on ballot measures legalizing marijuana in the November midterm elections, and should they pass, will join 19 others in legalizing…