Posted on 10/19/2009 6:49:21 PM PDT by stevelackner
The AP reports that "federal drug agents won't pursue pot-smoking patients or their sanctioned suppliers in states that allow medical marijuana, under new legal guidelines to be issued Monday by the Obama administration. Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state law. The guidelines to be issued by the department do, however, make it clear that agents will go after people whose marijuana distribution goes beyond what is permitted under state law or use medical marijuana as a cover for other crimes, the officials said."
I part from many of my fellow conservatives to commend Obama for this action. What it does is allow for marijuana policy to be decided by individual states. It shows respect for legislation passed by the individual states regarding marijuana.
In 2005, the Supreme Court actually ruled in favor of the Bush administration in Gonzalez v. Raich by holding that Congress’ Commerce Clause authority includes the power to prohibit the local cultivation and use of marijuana in compliance with California law. The majority opinion was written by Justice John Paul Stevens. The facts were, as Justice Stevens explained, that Diane "Monson cultivates her own marijuana, and ingests the drug in a variety of ways including smoking and using a vaporizer." Angel "Raich, by contrast, is unable to cultivate her own, and thus relies on two caregivers, litigating as 'John Does,' to provide her with locally grown marijuana at no charge... On August 15, 2002, county deputy sheriffs and agents from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) came to Monson’s home. After a thorough investigation, the county officials concluded that her use of marijuana was entirely lawful as a matter of California law. Nevertheless, after a 3-hour standoff, the federal agents seized and destroyed all six of her cannabis plants." The Court essentially ruled that "the CSA is a statute that regulates the production, distribution, and consumption of commodities for which there is an established, and lucrative, interstate market. Prohibiting the intrastate possession or manufacture of an article of commerce is a rational (and commonly utilized) means of regulating commerce in that product." Therefore, under the interstate commerce clause, the federal law trumps the state laws on this issue. Even Justice Antonin Scalia concurred in judgment with the majority of the Court, agreeing with the outcome but taking issue with "the doctrinal foundation on which that holding rests."
However, it is my opinion, as well as that of Justice Clarence Thomas, that the majority was abusing and misusing the Commerce Clause, stretching it far away from its original purpose and intent, using it to allow Congress to override constitutional state laws that legitimately belong within the realm of individual state legislative power. Justice Thomas explained that the intent of the Framers that authored the Commerce Clause was indeed to empower "Congress to regulate the buying and selling of goods and services trafficked across state lines." However, in James "Madison’s notes from the Constitutional Convention, The Federalist Papers, and the ratification debates, the term 'commerce' is consistently used to mean trade or exchange–not all economic or gainful activity that has some attenuated connection to trade or exchange." He emphasizes that Diane Monson and Angel Raich "neither buy nor sell the marijuana that they consume. They cultivate their cannabis entirely in the State of California–it never crosses state lines, much less as part of a commercial transaction. Certainly no evidence from the founding suggests that 'commerce' included the mere possession of a good or some purely personal activity that did not involve trade or exchange for value. In the early days of the Republic, it would have been unthinkable that Congress could prohibit the local cultivation, possession, and consumption of marijuana." In fact, Justice Thomas rightly declares "that Diane Monson and Angel Raich use marijuana that has never been bought or sold, that has never crossed state lines, and that has had no demonstrable effect on the national market for marijuana. If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything–and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers." It is this dissenting opinion which actually remains loyal to the Constitution.
The Obama administration's motives in parting from the Bush-era policy is not loyalty to the original meaning of the Commerce Clause. The Obama administration's justification is rather that federal lawyers prosecuting individual marijuana users who are in compliance with state law is not a "good use of their time." The fact remains, however, that this move by the President does in fact fall in line with opinion of Justice Thomas, an opinion I find to be the more accurate reflection of the Constitution's text and history. It is for this reason, and not because I have made a value judgment about how federal prosecutors should spend their time, that I support the administration's decision. The marijuana that those like Monson and Raich were using in compliance with California law was not being cultivated or used for the purpose of commerce between the states. As such, the federal government should know ita role and stop its interference in this area.
This thread is one bloke over the mime.
Obama gets it right, even if it’s for the wrong reason.
Yes, but the Nanny State Sycophants want to control people’s lives with the Drug War.
I agree with your article, but as far as Obama’s reasoning goes, I’d say that even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
Our early American forefathers constitutionally hung sodomites by their necks, until they were dead. We could do the same with potheads.
Is he right in the HOW? Via executive order or having a czar change the law versus through congress?
Is he right in the HOW? Via executive order or having a czar change the law versus through congress?
Allowing people the freedom to do things that are demonstrably harmful to their brains is never a good idea.
Might as well legalize inhalant huffing then, right?
It’s odd that WH would bring this up again- they said this back in April:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2230102/posts
“...since President Barack Obama took office and signaled that he won’t use federal marijuana laws to override state laws as the Bush administration did...”
Then there was the Saturday Address in which The 0ne repeated himself word for word, hmmm.
No kidding, change the law through legislative means.
Apparently those who seek a dictator have a very low price.
You’re no better than the leftists.
I did not think that there were many Nanny State Prohibitionists left in America.
It would be more Constitutional to abandon the failed war on pot entirely.
Certainly the more constitutional means.
LOL, file that wish with your pit bull killing fantasies!
You're quite bloodthirsty.
I hope you're not married.
The posted pro-leftist-hippie-commie-fascist-anti-American drug rant is a vanity from a blog, and it’s posted under “Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events;.” Crime stories about pit bulls mauling kids are only allowed under “pets” here.
There’s nothing conservative about that.
Prosecutorial discretion would seem to be a pretty fundamental aspect of law enforcement.
But, leaving that aside, marijuana could be removed from Schedule 1 of the CSA by purely executive action, I believe.
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