Posted on 11/02/2005 7:03:16 AM PST by Wolfie
Denver Pot Issue Passes By Thin Margin
Denver residents Tuesday voted to legalize possession of small amounts of marijuana, but the state attorney general said the vote was irrelevant because state law will still be enforced.
The measure passed 54 percent to 46 percent.
"It just goes to show the voters of Denver are fed up with a law that prohibits adults from making a rational, safer choice to use marijuana instead of alcohol," said Mason Tvert, executive director of Safer Alternative for Enjoyable Recreation, or SAFER.
The measure will change the city's ordinance to make it legal for adults 21 and older to possess up to an ounce of marijuana in the city.
Denver follows the city of Oakland, which last year voted to make marijuana possession its lowest enforcement priority and required the city to develop a plan for licensing and taxing the sale, use and cultivation of marijuana for private use. Voters in Telluride Tuesday defeated a similar measure.
Denver is "the second major city in less than a year to pass a vote which says that marijuana should be treated essentially like alcohol, taxed and regulated," said Bruce Mirken, the director of communications for the Washington, D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project, one of the largest groups opposing jail time for the use of pot. "This has been characterized as a fringe issue, and clearly it's not."
Even though voters approved Initiative 100, Denver police still will bring charges under state law, which carries a fine of up to $100 and a mandatory $100 drug-offender surcharge for possession of small amounts of marijuana, said Attorney General John Suthers.
"I have found these efforts to be unconstructive," Suthers said.
"I understand the debate about legalization and whether our drug laws are constructive. But I wish we would have a full-out debate instead of these peripheral issues that accomplish just about nothing," he said.
Tvert said marijuana supporters will push for a statewide initiative that would allow for the licensing and regulation of the selling of marijuana.
"This is not just symbolic," he said. "This is a fact. This city voted to change a city ordinance. We expect the city officials to respect the will of the voters who elected them."
In Denver, backers of the initiative sparked controversy with their campaign.
Denver City Councilman Charlie Brown blasted as deceptive their campaign signs, which declared: "Make Denver SAFER, Vote Yes on I-100." Brown said he feared voters would believe the initiative would put more police on Denver streets.
Under fire from domestic-violence groups, SAFER also pulled a controversial billboard that showed a battered woman and her abuser with the slogan "Reduce family and community violence in Denver. Vote Yes on I-100."
Proponents of the initiative tried to draw Mayor John Hickenlooper into the fray by labeling him a hypocrite for selling alcohol in his brewpubs when he opposed their efforts to legalize marijuana.
During one rally, they unveiled a banner that read: "What is the difference between Mayor Hickenlooper and a marijuana dealer? The mayor has made his fortune selling a more harmful drug: alcohol."
Tuesday night, Hickenlooper said he was surprised by the vote.
"It doesn't supersede state law, so it's really symbolic of changing attitudes," the mayor said.
Where did you read that? Seriously, I'd like to know.
"An amendment to the Constitution obviously appealed to temperance reformers more than a federal statute banning liquor. A simple congressional majority could adopt a statute but, with the shift of a relatively few votes, could likewise topple one. Drys feared that an ordinary law would be in constant danger of being overturned owing to pressure from liquor industry interests or the growing population of liquor-using immigrants. A constitutional amendment, on the other hand, though more difficult to achieve, would be impervious to change. Their reform would not only have been adopted, the Anti-Saloon League reasoned, but would be protected from future human weakness and backsliding."
-- druglibrary.org/schaffer/history/rnp/RNP1.html
"Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the following in Lopez:"
So you agree that Congress has no authority over matters that substantially affect interstate commerce? You believe that states and individuals are allowed to undermine and subvert constitutional Congressional interstate regulatory efforts?
THAT'S what Madison had in mind?
"And they don't mind throwing someone in jail for violating their "home rule" gun laws."
Actually, they failed. A recent court ruling slapped down Denver. Denver's gun issue have nothing to do with Home Rule and the court said so with their decision throwing out Denver's ban on guns in parks, cars, and concealed carry. Cities may alsways create strciter laws unless banned by state law and that is all that happened.
THAT'S what Madison had in mind?
One of the things that Madison more than probably had in mind was "to make regular" the commerce between one state and another, i.e. follow similar customs and procedures, prevent one state from putting a tarrif on another state's goods, etc. It's been said over and over again on these FR Drug War threads that in the 18th century, the verb "to regulate" also meant "to make regular," as in "regulate the militia," i.e., to make sure the militia used similar equipment throughout the several states. This makes perfect sense after fighting a global war relying, largely, on irregular forces wich often had basic supply and logistic problems because of differing command structures and equipment . . . basic things like the caliber of weapons.
Original intent is a tricky thing, no?
Because alcohol is legal. Making anything legal removes the 'stigma' as it were, and use will increase.
Oh, no doubt about that. Also because alcohol has been our societal "drug of choice" for centuries. But I was talking more about the social and physical devastation that accompanies alcoholism, which is on a par with abuse of the "harder" drugs like cocaine and heroin.
That's why I love FR -- you learn something every day.
So, to regulate commerce with foreign nations meant "to make regular"? Certainly not to impose tariffs or a ban or anything like that, right?
More absurd is to assert that the commerce clause applies to possession of an item. The commerce clause regards transportation of items across state lines. Not the possession of items.
And hey, if you think you have been harmed by a person's act of possessing drugs across the street or across town or across the state or across the country you could take that person to court before an impartial jury and do your best to convince them that you were harmed by the act of the defendant possessing drugs. I mean, if you were harmed by that act -- drug possession by the defendant -- you are due restitution for your pain and suffering. Somehow I think you'll lose that case 9 out of 10 times -- I think you know that too. Nor do I think that if drugs were decriminalized that you would chose to become a druggie -- I think you know that too.
"No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him." -- Thomas Jefferson
Original intent is a tricky thing, no?
As you demonstrated in your post it is no more tricky than understanding the norms, tradition and or status quo of the time in question. And whether the intent was to uphold one or more of those or to change them.
You have that exactly backwards. The highest power is with the individual in our system of government. The individuals grant powers (through representation) to various "levels" of government. It stands to reason that the "level of government" closest to the people would be the next highest "level" with the "levels" decreasing as one is further removed from the source of power or the people.
But I was talking more about the social and physical devastation that accompanies alcoholism, which is on a par with abuse of the "harder" drugs like cocaine and heroin.
The debilitating effect of alcohol on a persons ability to reason results in many people resorting to violence that in a sober state would not. Most hard drugs do not have a similar debilitating effect on ability to reason the leads to aggression.
Interestingly, the addition of violence as an effect of prohibition. Namely, gang violence and its innocent victims, Likewise the addition of violence as an effect of the war on drugs -- gang violence and its innocent victims.
The ratio of violence in the alcohol prohibition to violence by debilitation of reason under the influence of alcohol shows a higher ratio of violence comes from the debilitation of reason. Whereas in the prohibition of drugs the higher ratio of violence is in the prohibition. Ie., gang violence.
And you got all that from "to regulate"? And this also applies to commerce with foreign nations, since the identical phrase, "to regulate" is used?
"More absurd is to assert that the commerce clause applies to possession of an item."
I agree.
"Possession" falls into the substantial effect realm and, for that, the Necessary and Proper Clause applies.
"Somehow I think you'll lose that case 9 out of 10 times -- "
I don't, but I'm sure glad I don't have to do that all the time.
The citizens in Alaska felt that possession by adults (small amounts, in their homes) harmed their children in that marijuana use by Alaskan teens was double the national average, so in 1990 they passed a referendum to make marijuana illegal.
...and since then: # Alaska Supreme Court and lower courts have ruled that personal possession of cannabis is protected by state constitution's privacy clause. As recently as Sep 14, 2004, the AK Supreme Court refused to overturn a unanimous Appellate Court decision that police were not allowed to enter a home simply based on smelling cannabis smoke outside.
Most definitely an essense of it, my friend. The Framers certainly meant to avoid situations in which Massachusetts, for example, had a different trade agreement with Britain and France than did, say, North Carolina or Virginia. The goal of the Framers was to create a cohesive national government which presented the alliance of sovereign states as a single national entity to the world, yet preserved, as much as possible, the sovereignty of each individual state to conduct its own affairs.
"Somehow I think you'll lose that case 9 out of 10 times -- " 67
I don't, but I'm sure glad I don't have to do that all the time.
Since you're glad that you've seldom if ever have taken a person to court for drug possession claiming that you were harmed by their act of possessing drugs so that you may gain restitution for your claim of pain and suffering you make my case. Drug possession and use is prevalent in the U.S. Yet you have not been harmed, endured pain and suffering, by those people's possession or use of drugs. For if you had you'd take them before an impartial jury.
I've said this on FR ever since I started participating in the Drug War Threads. There is no harm unless it's proveable in court.
You believe that Congress and the courts are allowed to undermine and subvert the constitutional limits placed on the federal government by the States?
And do you still beat your wife?
Cities exist by the people voting to incorporate them, an incorporation power given by the state. The people create the state. People cannot create a city separate from the state.
Think of the prohibition of smoking in business establishments. Think of the business owner that chooses not to allow certain acts or people on their property. Assuming the business owner or property owner is not holding a person hostage the employee or customer or home-visitor has the choice to not associate -- leave the property -- as much as the business owner or home owner has the right to refuse to associate.
The status quo claim is that it violates a person's rights for a business to refuse a person access to the business. Yet, to pass a law forcing the business to grant access to a person violates the business owner's rights.
The status quo inverts justice.
Dude, sweet! I'm moving to..um...what were we talking about?
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