In the states which have medical marijuana and have decriminalized marijuana, which came first?
Posted on 03/11/2007 5:25:18 PM PDT by Wolfie
Medical marijuana: Governor's wrangling revives measure
New Mexico -- The state Senate on Saturday resurrected the medical marijuana issue, passing a new bill allowing people suffering certain serious medical conditions to smoke cannabis to treat their symptoms. The action came two days after the House voted 37-32 to defeat the original bill (Senate Bill 238). But on Saturday, the Senate voted 32-3 to pass Senate Bill 523, which now goes to the House.
Gov. Bill Richardson told The Associated Press on Friday that he had talked to several Democrats who had voted against that bill in an effort to get them to change their minds. He also said he planned to talk with House Speaker Ben Luján, D-Nambé. Luján is a Richardson ally but an opponent of medical marijuana.
SB 523, sponsored by Sen. Shannon Robinson, D-Albuquerque, originally pertained only to topical uses of cannabis, such as ointments and patches. But Robinson agreed to submit a substitute bill that incorporated the provisions of the bill that was defeated in the House.
Sen. Carol Leavell, R-Jal, one of three to vote against Robinson's bill, said, "We're sending a very poor, poor message to our citizens."
Sen. Rod Adair, R-Roswell, a vocal proponent of medical marijuana, expressed frustration with opponents of the issue, including members of his own party in the House, some of whom, he said, deliberately confused the medical marijuana proposal with decriminalizing marijuana for everyone.
"This is a 30-page bill with strict controls, and (opponents) say that sends the wrong signal?" Adair asked. "The signal (opponents) send is that you don't understand the bill."
Adair noted that the medical marijuana program contained in the bill applies to only about 150 to 175 people statewide.
For the past seven years, drug-law reform advocates have been trying to get the Legislature to adopt a medical marijuana program. The Senate has passed such bills several times, only to see the legislation die in the House.
In 1978, the Legislature passed a medical marijuana research project at the urging of Lynn Pierson, a cancer patient who died before the bill went into effect. That bill had a "sunset clause," which means it expired several years ago.
All laws except what I would call the "natural" laws, (murder, rape, robbery, etc.) should have a sunset clause. That would keep the politicians busy and force them the prioritize which laws they impose on us.
I disagree. If all laws were put to the test of strict Constitutional interpreration before even being passed, there would be no need for sunset clauses.
We don't need to make politians more busy than they already are messing with our rights. We need to keep them on a tighter leash and make it a part time job as I think our Founding Fathers intended.
We need to keep them on a tighter leash and make it a part time job as I think our Founding Fathers intended.
-----
Bravo. Priority one. Term limits are a must and the thinking half of the USA had better press hard for the limits. That would be the first step back to a GOVERNMENT FOR AND BY THE PEOPLE. Right now it really distills down to a good ole boy network in Washington, that has found that socialism can be easily traded for votes and power....we are in a lot of trouble right now, and we have to fix America. Soon.
Yeah, right. The state better be prepared to print up at least 10,000 medical marijuana ID cards. Oregon has 12,000.
Out of a population of 3.5 million? The Horror.
"This is a 30-page bill with strict controls, and (opponents) say that sends the wrong signal?" Adair asked. "The signal (opponents) send is that you don't understand the bill."
For over a hundred years politicians and bureaucrats have been sending the wrong signal. That signal is that they know best how to take care of you and everybody. Their hidden authoritarian agenda manifested their obvious fascist/socialist/collectivist welfare state. Careful not to call politicians and bureaucrats the nanny state because that would imply they have good intentions for the citizens rather than usurping power and glory for themselves as their driving motivation. For the most part the main-stream media facilitated them. Parasitical elites -- the lot of them.
The best the government can do is protect citizens from foreign invasion. It can do crime follow up on U.S. soil but is seldom there when a real crime is committed. Real crimes are things that 98% of the population doesn't do; they don't initiate force, threat of force or fraud against persons or their property.
If politicians and bureaucrats cared about citizens they'd not prohibit marijuana. At most they'd have an opinion on it. Leaving to each citizen; his and her choice of self-medication and diet -- what a person puts into their body. Preferably with the advice of a competent doctor.
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H. L. Mencken
And that's how we got a quarter-million laws and regulations. Not to benefit the citizens and society, but rather, for parasitical elites to usurp power and glory while garnering unearned paychecks. With 95% of the laws and regulations comes the cost of lost opportunity for citizens and society.
Value destruction by common criminals is dwarfed by the trillion dollars of value destruction by parasitical elite fraudsters. Without a doubt value creators/producers in science and business have cared for citizens and society several magnitude more effectively than parasitical elites in government. And that's true despite the massive opportunity cost inflicted upon them by government officials.
The Ultimate Battle is On...
Who is the value producer
versus
Who is the value destroyer?
Yeah, right. The state better be prepared to print up at least 10,000 medical marijuana ID cards. Oregon has 12,000.
"New Mexico -- The state Senate on Saturday resurrected the medical marijuana issue..."
Your reading comprehension is as pathetic as the drivel you post/spew on the WOD and RKBA threads.
MY reading comprehension?
I was comparing New Mexico to Oregon. Not exactly the same size, but close. Oregon has 12,000 medical marijuana users, yet New Mexico says they only have 150 to 175.
Not for long.
Fair enough?
Hardly. Once medical marijuana is legal in New Mexico, patients can be expected to avail themselves of the option. That's not failure, that's success.
In the states which have medical marijuana and have decriminalized marijuana, which came first?
Decrm was a 70's thing. Medical wasn't even on the map back then.
Early in the 70s is when Mass. banned everything to do with pot! I was reading about marijuana back then and found out about the ban when I went to buy another book about it.
I'll never forget it because what I was studying back then was the hypocrisy of some laws and civilians attitudes toward it. So when the books were banned, it was particularly freaky.
Oh, most definitely.
Therefore, we both agree the article saying that the "bill applies to only about 150 to 175 people statewide" is very misleading. Hell, when it's said and done, there may be 15,000 to 17,500 "patients" smoking dope, right?
"That's not failure, that's success."
No, it's failure. Failure because people are obviously abusing the system.
It's like any other prescription drug. Nobody uses it until it hits the market. And then lots of people use it. You can define that as abuse if you want (and I know you do).
The Senator said "the bill applies to only about 150 to 175 people statewide", leading people to believe 150 to 175 people will be using medical marijuana.
Now you can spread your sand and start dancin', but that doesn't change the fact that Senator Adair made a very misleading statement.
See? That's how your side "revives the measure". They lie.
I think maybe it's time for Alberto Gonzales to schedule a trip to New Mexico -- maybe give a speech somewhere on, oh, "Federal Law and the Supremacy Clause" or something like that.
Drug warriors seem to cite the supremacy clause a lot, so let’s see what is it says.
“This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”
It is important to note the word Pursuance, which means carrying something out or carrying something into effect, in this case the Constitution. Therefore, to be the “Supreme law of the land” laws passed by Congress must be laws that the Constitution gives Congress the authority to pass. Nowhere in the constitution does it say Congress has the power to prohibit or schedule drugs. Using the Supremacy clause to defend the War on Drugs is a weak argument at best.
Wouldn't matter to you if it was only one person. Wouldn't matter to me if it were one million.
Congress does not have the power to regulate the interstate commerce of drugs? New one on me.
Medical marijuana is a scam, you know it's a scam, and you don't care that it's a scam because you favor legalization for recreational use.
Yet you post these medical marijuana threads as though you actually care for the welfare of these patients and you only really want what's best for them. You and the good Senator have a lot in common.
That's all merely your opinion. Post it as such. Have a nice day.
So, according to you, pot could be legal in State A and legal in State B and only illegal in the split second that it crosses the state line? Tough one to enforce, wouldn't you agree? Then again, you don't want it enforced.
"if there is any chance it will affect interstate commerce"
That's my interpretation? Nice try.
THE interpretation is that IF an in-state activity (it need not be commerce) has a substantial effect on the interstate commerce that Congress is constitutionally regulating, then Congress may regulate that activity.
If they couldn't, then private pilots flying within a state could fly into controlled airspace whenever they wanted, couldn't they?
"it is commerce that the government claims they want to eliminate."
Congres may not prohibit the interstate commerce of an item? Can you support that statement with any facts?
"I suggest you read O'Conner's and Thomas's dissents in Gonzales v. Raich."
I suggest you read Scalia's.
If I have a switchblade in State A, how do you know it came from State B? Or didn't come from State B?
Wouldn't you have to catch the person as they're crossing state lines? Isn't this what I said?
"One of my points was that people could easily use marijuana without any interstate commerce in the drug occurring"
How would you know that interstate commerce did not occur? How would the government know it DID occur?
I believe the benchmark is "a substantial effect". Apparently that benchmark has not yet been met with switchblades.
"If a certain company manufactures identical switchblades in two states, both of which do not prohibit switchblades, it would be almost impossible to prove I did or did not take one across the state line and whether I broke the law or not. But that is all Congress prohibited."
The same thing, of course, would happen with marijuana if Congress did not use the power of the Necessary and Proper Clause to control the in-state production, transportation, and use of it.
"that marijuana should be controlled by Congress boils down to the fact that you simply don’t like marijuana"
I haven't seen any good reason to legalize it.
And how does the Necessary and Proper clause give Congress power to regulate in-state production of marijuana? "The Congress shall have power …To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof." All this clause does is give Congress the ability to pass laws that carry out it's Constitutionally defined powers, and I have said before there is no such power for Congress to regulate the intrastate use of marijuana.
You say there is no good reason to legalize marijuana? How about the fact that there were no grounds for criminalizing it to begin with, and that the decriminalization of marijuana would basically destroy the financial incentive for gangs to traffic it, making decriminalization the moral choice.
One more thing, can you tell me exactly what positive things society has gained from the prohibition of marijuana?
Congress can try. But as we saw with the U.S. Supreme Court decisions in both Lopez and Morrison, Congress may not succeed.
Besides, if the people don't like the legislation they can pressure Congress to change it -- as they did with the luxury tax and the federal AWB.
"All this clause does is give Congress the ability to pass laws that carry out it's Constitutionally defined powers"
That is correct. Congress has the power to regulate interstate commerce. If something interferes with Congress' ability to regulate interstate commerce, this clause gives Congress the power to rectify that.
You don't think Congress has the power to do that?
"and that the decriminalization of marijuana would basically destroy the financial incentive for gangs to traffic it"
Let's assume that's true. It's not, but I'll play along. Of all the illegal recreational drugs sold in the U.S., marijuana represents about 15% of the total dollar volume. Therefore, take away marijuana completely and the gangs will take a 15% hit.
BUT, marijuana is big, bulky, smelly, and hard to smuggle. Plus everybody's growing their own. It's hard to make big money.
Legalize marijuana and the gangs will simply focus on the other soft drugs and the harder drugs to make up that 15%. They are NOT going to go out of business and get real jobs.
"One more thing, can you tell me exactly what positive things society has gained from the prohibition of marijuana?"
A lower number of users. Legalize marijuana and its use would double or triple -- with a large increase in teen use.
How can you be sure that there would be a higher number of teen users if marijuana were legalized? Yes, I know there have been a few states that "decriminalized" marijuana, but as you said before the Feds refuse to respect those laws and it is still not legal to actually sell or buy the drug. Therefore the use of marijuana hasn't been legal in America since the 1920s (before which almost no one used marijuana) and the "forbidden fruit" aspect has always been there, so you have no valid data to compare it to. If you were to go to the Netherlands, where marijuana is sold legally in coffee shops, you would find that the vast number of users are foreigners. The Dutch themselves are not heavy users. Besides, if you understood how marijuana, tobacco, and alcohol affect your body, you would agree that marijuana is by far the safest of all 3 of the drugs for teens to use.
Congress has a "finding" in the Controlled Substances Act that says local cultivation contributes to interstate commerce. Hard to believe, huh?
"How can you be sure that there would be a higher number of teen users if marijuana were legalized?"
The Alaska experiment.
The Alaska state constitution actually has a privacy clause in it. That clause was used to legalize (not decriminalize, legalize) "personal use" amounts of marijuana for use by adults in their homes. Kinda like what you want, right?
(A side note: Why the privacy clause didn't allow a small amount of other drugs like heroin and cocaine remains a mystery. Also, why the privacy clause limited the amount of marijuana is also a mystery.)
That started, I believe, in 1975. In 1988, the University of Alaska did a teen survey of marijuana and found that teen use in Alaska was double that of the U.S. national teen average. (Yes, I know you're saying that's because it's Alaska, they're different, more of a frontier spirit, yada, yada. Not true. Bear with me.)
Anyways, the parents went crazy, drew up a citizen initiative to make marijuana illegal, and passed it in 1990. Over the next ten years, Alaskan teen use dropped to within 1% of the national teen average (It was something like Alaska 9%, national average 8%).
"The Dutch themselves are not heavy users."
Of marijuana, yes. But they have a huge teen drinking problem there. It appears the teens there would rather get drunk than get high. Which is why you shouldn't try to compare different cultures.
If I said that Saki was abused more in Japan than in the United States, could I draw any conclusions about Japanese laws?
"Besides, if you understood how marijuana, tobacco, and alcohol affect your body, you would agree that marijuana is by far the safest of all 3 of the drugs for teens to use."
Nice try. This would be relevant if our drug laws were based on the relative safety of the drug. They're not.
More correctly, the safety of the drug is not the sole criterion.
"This means that the War on Drugs is not made to stop drug users from harming others or themselves."
Correct. That would be an impossibility.
The drug laws simply spell out the consequences for manufacturing, distributing or possessing certain drugs, leaving the decision to do so up to the individual.
"In fact, since the drug laws allow alcohol and tobacco to be used but don't allow the less harmful marijuana to be used, isn't the War on Drugs encouraging drug users to harm themselves and society more?"
Alcohol and tobacco are both highly regulated, from manufacturing through distribution. The War on Drugs no more encourages the use of these products any more than it encourages the eating of fatty foods.
So why wouldn't it make sense to legalize drugs and regulate them with the same way alcohol and tobacco are regulated?
Tobacco's not in the same league.
The power to regulate alcohol was taken away from the federal government and turned over exclusively to the states by Section 2 of the 21st amendment (Section 1 merely repealed the 18th and put everything back where it was). We would first need to pass a constitutional amendment for drugs, removing the power to regulate them from the federal government. There isn't anywhere near the votes to do that.
Assuming an amendment passed, it would be up to each state to then regulate drugs how they see fit. This works today for alcohol because each state legalizes it. Would every state legalize every drug? Doubtful.
Therefore, we'd end up with some states legal and some not. The smuggling from legal to non-legal would be rampant and uncontrollable. States would ask for federal help. The federal government would pass ineffective legislation.
Exaggeration? Nope. This is exactly what happened in the early 1900's with alcohol. The legislation was the Webb-Kenyon Act. What resulted a few years later was Prohibition.
The bottom line is that it wouldn't work. I know that. You know that. Why even go down that path when it will end up right where it is today?
No. I meant that drugs would end up being prohibited at the national level, just as they are today. Regulating legal drugs on a state-by-state basis is unworkable.
"How does people using less of a harmless substance ..."
If it's harmless, then why are you suggesting it be regulated like alcohol and tobacco? Can we agree it's not harmless?
And if it's not harmless, then the less people using it the better, correct?
"Legalizing marijuana would not only not harm society, but it would help it by freeing police and the court systems from having to prosecute criminals who have hurt nobody."
Can't you say exactly the same about legalizing other soft drugs like nitrous, Ecstasy, GHB, peyote, shrooms, etc.? Should they also be legal?
Legalizing hard drugs like meth, cocaine and heroin would also free the police and the court systems from having to prosecute criminals who have hurt nobody. The same argument applies to prostitution, gambling and pornography.
Restricting your argument to just marijuana, we can accomplish what you want with decriminalization. Marijuana is still illegal, but the penalty for simple possession is a small fine, like a speeding ticket. Mail it in, no court, no trial, no police, no jail. No need to legalize.
That is a reasonable solution. I think this is the direction we are going with marijuana laws in this country anyway. Well, I've enjoyed debating with you, if it wasn't for you the drug threads would be very boring.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.