Posted on 02/20/2015 11:54:50 AM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
DENVER — Colorado already is being sued by two neighboring states for legalizing marijuana. Now, the state faces groundbreaking lawsuits from its own residents, who are asking a federal judge to order the new recreational industry to close.
The owners of a mountain hotel and a southern Colorado horse farm argue in a pair of lawsuits filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Denver that the 2012 marijuana-legalization measure has hurt their property and that the marijuana industry is stinky and attracts unsavory visitors.
(Excerpt) Read more at registerguard.com ...
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Ah, so you're saying that your town has greater powers than the State, that it can just ignore portions of the State Constitution it doesn't like? I guess that means your municipal court can simply refuse to hear a case because they don't like you, or perhaps they can simply drag it on forever, or maybe they can sell tickets
to get into a fast track
to get your case heard.
Art II, Section 6. Equality of justice.
Courts of justice shall be open to every person, and a speedy remedy afforded for every injury to person, property or character; and right and justice should be administered without sale, denial or delay.
Can you point to the clause in the Constitution that would validate such a law?
Actually it does — because the law is not valid.
That's right, it is a legal non-entity.
Why?
The Constitution speciffically prohibits laws of an Ex Post Facto nature to both the federal government and the states; even with the Supreme Courts considering this restriction only upon criminal laws, that this increased the punishments of those already tried and convected makes it ex post facto.
Counterfeiting is one of the crimes mentioned in the Constitution; it is explicitly put under the control of Congress and therefore properly a federal crime — no such power exists for drugs.
You and that other guy who pointed this out are missing the forest by focusing on a tree. The point is that the consequences of some activities do not remain within the state.
So let's say they aren't counterfeiting money, but are instead counterfeiting movies or clothing, or whatever. Would the consequences stay within the state?
Pot is an activity that won't remain in a state. If one state has it, it will encourage people in other states to engage in it as well. (as the lawsuits are even now alleging) It will grow and spread as drugs invariably do if given a host population.
No, the point is that the Federal government has no such right/power.
Your argument is, essentially, the same as the exigent circumstance
argument used by the courts to ignore the requirements of the 4th Amendment — namely that staying within the confines of the Constitution would present some sort of difficulty or harm.
I assert the opposite: that by not having a government constrained by the Constitution we invite lawless abuse upon ourselves.
Pot is an activity that won't remain in a state. If one state has it, it will encourage people in other states to engage in it as well. (as the lawsuits are even now alleging) It will grow and spread as drugs invariably do if given a host population.
Really? I don't see legalized prostitution being proactively pushed by the other states because one state has it. Or do you mean to tell me that because one state allows it that all states must allow it?
Now now...not everyone there is a barking moonbat. The native non-California Coloradicals are pretty conservative.
If a state changed its laws to take away felons right to vote and applied it retroactively to already convicted felons it would be an ex post facto law.
There is nothing unconstitutional about making removal of voting rights an additional punishment for felons before they are convicted.
You do realize that's exactly what happened with the Gun Control Act of 1968 WRT firearms, right?
It shall be unlawful for any person to sell or otherwise dispose of any firearm or ammunition to any person knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that such person— (1) is under indictment for, or has been convicted in any court of, a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
There is nothing unconstitutional about making removal of voting rights an additional punishment for felons before they are convicted.
Ah, so we throw out the presumption of innocence? Or are you trying to say that because there aren't any
people who were convicted but still serving when it was passed that it somehow became magically Constitutional?
I'm sorry, but there's no statute of limitations
on a contraconstitutional act, it doesn't suddenly become constitutional because time has passed.
If the Gun Control Act of 1968 was applied retroactively to already convicted felons then it would clearly be an ex post facto law. If it was only applied to felons convicted after the date that the act was enacted then it would not be an ex post facto law.
Similarly, if a state passes a law prohibiting felons from voting and applies it retroactively to already convicted felons it is an ex post facto law. If the law is only applied to felons convicted after the law is enacted then it is not an ex post facto law.
All ex post facto means is after the fact.
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