Posted on 03/05/2014 10:14:41 AM PST by Kaslin
Raymond Yans is president of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB), the U.N. agency charged with monitoring the implementation of anti-drug treaties. It is therefore not surprising that Yans takes a dim view of marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington, which he says poses "a grave danger to public health and well-being."
But according to the INCB, legalization is not just dangerous; legalization is illegal. Even Americans who support marijuana prohibition should be troubled by the implications of that argument, which suggests that international treaties trump the Constitution.
In an INCB report issued on Tuesday, Yans scolds the U.S. government for letting Colorado and Washington repeal criminal penalties for production, possession and distribution of cannabis. "INCB reiterates that these developments contravene the provisions of the drug control conventions, which limit the use of cannabis to medical and scientific use only," he writes. "INCB urges the Government of the United States to ensure that the treaties are fully implemented on the entirety of its territory."
Under our federalist system, however, states have no obligation to punish every activity that Congress chooses to treat as a crime. The Supreme Court has said, based on a dubious reading of the power to regulate interstate commerce, that the federal government may continue to enforce its own ban on marijuana in states that take a different approach. But that does not mean the feds can compel states to help, let alone force them to enact their own bans.
According to the INCB, none of that matters. "The international drug control treaties must be implemented by States parties, including States with federal structures, regardless of their internal legislation, on their entire territory," it says in a recent position paper. "Those treaty obligations are applicable with respect to the entire territory of each State party, including its federated states and/or provinces."
In other words, our government is required to impose marijuana prohibition on recalcitrant states, regardless of what the Constitution says. Can that be true? Only if you believe that international treaties can give Congress authority that was not granted by the Constitution, which would obliterate the doctrine of enumerated powers and the state autonomy that depends on it.
Even if treaties could override federalism, the agreements that the INCB cites do not purport to do so. The 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs says compliance is subject to "constitutional limitations" and undertaken with "due regard to (signatories') constitutional, legal and administrative systems." The 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances and the 1988 Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances contain similar provisions.
In light of such language, how can the INCB insist that "internal legislation" and "federal structures" have no bearing on a country's obligations under these treaties? "The INCB is just flat-out wrong in making such a claim," says Richard Elliott, executive director of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network. "The INCB's claim that its narrow, restrictive interpretations of the conventions override domestic constitutional law cannot stand in light of the actual wording of the conventions."
The INCB cites Article 27 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, which says "a party may not invoke the provisions of its internal law as justification for its failure to perform a treaty." It also mentions Article 29, which says "unless a different intention appears from the treaty or is otherwise established, a treaty is binding upon each party in respect of its entire territory."
Yet "it's a basic principle of statutory interpretation that a specific statute or command trumps a general one," notes Alex Kreit, a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law who specializes in drug policy. In this case, the drug treaties make allowances for the constitutional principles that the INCB says are irrelevant.
So is the U.S. government violating international law by letting Colorado and Washington do what they have every right to do? No, and that desperate claim is yet another sign that pot prohibitionists are panicking.
The Commerce Clause has been expanded to the point where states are just clients of the federal government and the Constitution no longer applies.
Hemp has been grown for centuries. George Washington grew hemp.
I’d rather we just ban the UN and all of its creepy treaties too.
It’s not illegal, but it is correct to say that legalizing it will put us in violation of some international drug control treaties. The ironic part is that we strong armed the rest of the world into joining those treaties in the first place.
“The ironic part is that we strong armed the rest of the world into joining those treaties in the first place.”
That irony is so thick, you could grind it into fine shreds, wrap it in paper, and smoke it.
Lectures from a damned Belgian...
The truth is,, treaties aren’t intended to be enforced on America. They are meant to keep the other countries in line. Now their main function is to provide work for bureaucrats.
The 10th Amendment to the US Constitution says:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
This is a matter for the people of each state to deal with IMO.
Thomas Jefferson recommended "an infusion" of it as a remedy for headache.
Where in the US Constitution does Congress get the power to ban any substance?
The pharmacological properties of hemp were well enough known that every medicine cabinet had some form of extract of hemp for the relief of pain. Washington washed his mouth out nightly with a tea made of hemp to reduce the discomfort from his dentures.
It was not until the Sixties that it was discovered that the active ingredient of the hemp plant -- tetrahydrocannibinol, or THC -- was just barely soluble in water. Thus, Washington, Jefferson and others who took hemp extract with water did not get the full analgesic effect from the plant. THC, however, is highly soluble in alcohol, so pressing the leaves in some form of wine would have released the THC more effectively.
Had any of these gentlemen been the kind of fellow who loitered around the slave quarters, they would have heard a bit of African folklore stating that the best way to get that fast, fast fast relief of pain from the hemp plant was to inhale the vapors of the burning leaves. To my knowledge, none of the men of that generation knew about that.
Hemp and marijuana are not the same. A real big canard from the choom gang nationwide.
But it's still hemp.
“Had any of these gentlemen been the kind of fellow who loitered around the slave quarters, they would have heard a bit of African folklore stating that the best way to get that fast, fast fast relief of pain from the hemp plant was to inhale the vapors of the burning leaves. To my knowledge, none of the men of that generation knew about that.”
This is purely conjecture. Jefferson & Washington both grew tobacco. Both grew marijuana. Both had first generation African slaves. Both smoked their tobacco and more than likely smoked their marijuana. Case in point: Some of the Plymouth Colony were known “broom” smokers (Scotch Broom...a relative of the tobacco plant..the effects of which, when smoked, was a marijuana like euphoric high that lasted about 30 minutes, followed by 4 to 5 hours of advanced color perception). Reason alone signifies that experimentation into the smoke-able properties of a vast variety of plants was widely practiced by the earliest Anglo New World settlers and the knowledge of such was not exclusively reliant on the customs practices of slaves. Jefferson was more than likely toking up when he was boinking on his favorite slave ladies. That Washington and Jefferson knew nothing of the smoke-able properties of marijuana seems absurd.
Which section of the Constitution delegates that power to Congress?
Exactly WHERE is this authority granted? Hint: Read the 10th Amendment before you go looking.
The Nanny Staters don’t care. They want to control what they want to control. Period. The Constitution be damned.
As for the Nanny Staters, the UN, or the DEA, or anybody hell thrashing around as their conrol and jobs slowly circle the drain...bite me.
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