Suppose that a particular right is both worthy of judicial support and in need of it. The details of codification take on an importance equal that of the right itself, because the final law is responsible to the entire legal system and also to itself.
To whatever degree possible, that code must draw into its wording the following attributes, even if for some rights, justice is left incomplete by virtue of portions of the sought right's co-obligation being excluded from code:
Intelligibility both to the general public and those entrusted with its enforcement.
Avoidance of subtle messages which encourage what is being criminalized.
Ease in ferreting out those to be tried without compromising the case as brought to trial.
Establishment and maintenance of trust in the legal system to adjudicate indiscriminately matters of guilt and innocence.
Compare these two laws:
(Actual) Drug possession is the crime of having one or more illegal drugs in one's possession, either for personal use, distribution, sale or otherwise.
(Hypothetical) Suppose instead possession of a drug were legal, but accepted as evidence that its possessor had made a contribution (financial or otherwise) to racketeers in the illicit drug industry. With that evidence RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) or CCES (Continuing Criminal Enterprise Statute) charges are brought.
Intelligibility comes easily with either statute since possession is something we have all understood since our first rattle.
The current law subtly attaches value to illicit drugs even beyond their price. After all some are willing to risk years in prison for what would already cost them lots of money. Merely because the drug trade attaches value to their product, why must the legal system validate that near sightedness. The alternative does not.
Currently the drug is confiscated to keep this prized item away from the public. The alternative would confiscate it merely as evidence without concern for exactly how worth or worthless it may be.
Journalism has been breaking away from such messages but has a way to go. First there was $1,000,000,000 in heroin, then heroin with a street value of $1,000,000,000. Perhaps someday it will be heroin at $1,000,000,000 on the addicted market.
In either case, ascertaining possession can run into the Fourth Amendment's protection from unreasonable search and seizure. When police profile towards a possible search, they confront those who respect a privacy blended in with those who respect a cache.
In some cases, the question of who it is that exactly possesses the illicit drug, strains trust in the legal system. This alternative would inherit all of that.