WI: China legalizes opium before the Opium Wars

Just before the First Opium War, there was a serious debate in the Chinese royal court on whether to legalize opium. Some officials thought that legalizing it would mean a barter system between tea and opium would develop, stopping the drain of precious metals that was one of the causes of China's economic decline, and that it would cause the development of a domestic opium industry, thus stopping the reliance on British opium. But the anti-opium side won, and China suffered the Opium Wars.

What if China legalized opium instead?
 
They wouldn't be able to cultivate enough opium to avoid British imports anyways.

Funny thing, when Indian tea took over Chinese tea in the British home market, the moralists "encouraged" the slow shutdown of the opium exports... long after the Qing suffered humiliation at the British hands, long after many Chinese addicts were hooked, and long after a letter was sent to Queen Victoria asking the British to stop or at least limit the opium.
 
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