Posted on 09/06/2002 8:59:47 AM PDT by MrLeRoy
It's enough for a big thumbs up ... or a big light up, if you prefer.
Canada should legalize marijuana use by adults, a Senate committee recommended Wednesday. The report comes on the heels of a two-year study of public policy relating to pot.
The present system of prohibition on marijuana just doesn't work, the committee found. Obviously, the committee learned something from early 20th-century history, when alcohol was prohibited in the United States. Then, prohibition simply gave gangsters a product to move and people to shoot.
Instead of the current system that penalizes people for having small quantities of pot on them, there should instead be a regulated system for marijuana, perhaps like our current system for alcohol, the committee determined.
"Scientific evidence overwhelmingly indicates that cannabis is substantially less harmful than alcohol and should be treated not as a criminal issue but as a social and health issue," said Senator Pierre Claude Nolin, the committee chair.
It's true that taking pot still involves the harmful intake of smoke, which the committee recognized. But, as the committee pointed out, it's more of a health issue than anything else.
In addition, making pot legal would clear the way for our police to tackle other, more harmful crimes relating to the public good. Really, would you rather see a pot smoker or a child molester behind bars?
Whether the federal government will ever adopt the Senate recommendations is up in the air. Hopefully the feds won't throw up a smokescreen on this to cloud the issue, and goes ahead with legalization.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
No-knock raids, blank search warrants, wrong addresses... thinks like that.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
How about property siezures, anonymous snitches, things like this?
Nope, government's job is to protect rights from other people. If you hurt other's property, life or break a contract (form of theft), that's the role of government, not enforce a nanny-state.
As for the war on drugs, unfortunately the U.S. lacks the resolve to win the war. For all the bad press China gets, they do take drugs far more seriously, to the point of executing those found in possession of dealer-quantities of drugs.
Yes and China is such a conservative nation? You are continuing to prove my point. The drug war is a big government socialists.Geeze we dont even execute rapists anymore.
Amendment X
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.
Let me see, since there is no authority in the Constitution for a fedgov war on some drugs, it stands to reason that DEA is an unconstitutional, extralegal and out of control agency, as is the drug czar, NIDA, etcetera... And I have YET to hear a drug warrior answer the fundamental question: Does FedGov own my (non-illicit-substance-using) body or do I?
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
100s of cases of cops not getting probable cause, and no knock raids.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Can you say asset forfeiture?
Amendment X
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
Please point to me where in the Constitution the federal government is delegated the right to a drug war (why was an amendment for alcohol needed?)
Fifth -- No one has a right to contraband or assets gained from illegal activities.
Tenth -- The WoD is authorized by the Constitution in Art. I § 8's Commerce Clause by stating that drugs represent a drain on interstate commerce. I tend to agree that the Commerce Clause gets used all too frequently, but here it seems much more logically used than elsewhere.
Because they use 'probable' cause. An 'unknown' informant 'clues them' in. If I call and say my neighbor--without any proof--is running a drug ring--they can--and do--just bust in the doors. Fifth -- No one has a right to contraband or assets gained from illegal activities.
That's the thing, they can take property before you are found guilty, and its hard as hell to get back, if possible at all. Tenth -- The WoD is authorized by the Constitution in Art. I § 8's Commerce Clause by stating that drugs represent a drain on interstate commerce. I tend to agree that the Commerce Clause gets used all too frequently, but here it seems much more logically used than elsewhere.
This is utter nonsense and a NEW DEAL (read socialist/'liberal') interpretation of the 10th amendment and the commerce clause. First, if I grow it in my yard, it isn't interstate commerce, therefore the government cannot regulate it. Second, why the need for the 18th & 21st amendment. Third Why even have the 10th amendment if the 'commerce clause' and 'general welfare' clause covers everything.
Veto of federal public works bill
March 3, 1817
To the House of Representatives of the United States: Having considered the bill this day presented to me entitled "An act to set apart and pledge certain funds for internal improvements," and which sets apart and pledges funds "for constructing roads and canals, and improving the navigation of water courses, in order to facilitate, promote, and give security to internal commerce among the several States, and to render more easy and less expensive the means and provisions for the common defense," I am constrained by the insuperable difficulty I feel in reconciling the bill with the Constitution of the United States to return it with that objection to the House of Representatives, in which it originated.
The legislative powers vested in Congress are specified and enumerated in the eighth section of the first article of the Constitution, and it does not appear that the power proposed to be exercised by the bill is among the enumerated powers, or that it falls by any just interpretation with the power to make laws necessary and proper for carrying into execution those or other powers vested by the Constitution in the Government of the United States.
"The power to regulate commerce among the several States" can not include a power to construct roads and canals, and to improve the navigation of water courses in order to facilitate, promote, and secure such commerce with a latitude of construction departing from the ordinary import of the terms strengthened by the known inconveniences which doubtless led to the grant of this remedial power to Congress.
To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation, as rendering the special and careful enumeration of powers which follow the clause nugatory and improper. Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust. It would have the effect of subjecting both the Constitution and laws of the several States in all cases not specifically exempted to be superseded by laws of Congress, it being expressly declared "that the Constitution of the United States and laws made in pursuance thereof shall be the supreme law of the land, and the judges of every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding." Such a view of the Constitution, finally, would have the effect of excluding the judicial authority of the United States from its participation in guarding the boundary between the legislative powers of the General and the State Governments, inasmuch as questions relating to the general welfare, being questions of policy and expediency, are unsusceptible of judicial cognizance and decision. A restriction of the power "to provide for the common defense and general welfare" to cases which are to be provided for by the expenditure of money would still leave within the legislative power of Congress all the great and most important measures of Government, money being the ordinary and necessary means of carrying them into execution.
If a general power to construct roads and canals, and to improve the navigation of water courses, with the train of powers incident thereto, be not possessed by Congress, the assent of the States in the mode provided in the bill can not confer the power. The only cases in which the consent and cession of particular States can extend the power of Congress are those specified and provided for in the Constitution.
I am not unaware of the great importance of roads and canals and the improved navigation of water courses, and that a power in the National Legislature to provide for them might be exercised with signal advantage to the general prosperity. But seeing that such a power is not expressly given by the Constitution, and believing that it can not be deduced from any part of it without an inadmissible latitude of construction and reliance on insufficient precedents; believing also that the permanent success of the Constitution depends on a definite partition of powers between the General and the State Governments, and that no adequate landmarks would be left by the constructive extension of the powers of Congress as proposed in the bill, I have no option but to withhold my signature from it, and to cherishing the hope that its beneficial objects may be attained by a resort for the necessary powers to the same wisdom and virtue in the nation which established the Constitution in its actual form and providently marked out in the instrument itself a safe and practicable mode of improving it as experience might suggest.
James Madison,
President of the United States
"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions." - James Madison, Letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792 _Madison_ 1865, I, page 546
"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constitutents." - James Madison, regarding an appropriations bill for French refugees, 1794
"With respect to the words general welfare, I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators." - James Madison, Letter to James Robertson, April 20, 1831 _Madison_ 1865, IV, pages 171-172
"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated." - Thomas Jefferson
"Probable cause" is not a catch-all. If they search without a warrant, no evidence is used from that search and the pothead goes free sans dope.
That's the thing, they can take property before you are found guilty, and its hard as hell to get back, if possible at all.
If the "property" is the weed, don't expect to get it back. If the property is something else, go back to court to get it. It's that simple.
This is utter nonsense and a NEW DEAL (read socialist/'liberal') interpretation of the 10th amendment and the commerce clause. First, if I grow it in my yard, it isn't interstate commerce, therefore the government cannot regulate it. Second, why the need for the 18th & 21st amendment. Third Why even have the 10th amendment if the 'commerce clause' and 'general welfare' clause covers everything.
I haven't the time nor the inclination to spell out every aspect of the case law and statutes for the past 200 years as to why that interpretation prevails. Trust me, it does. It is much more extensive (not to mention binding) than the notes and quotes you've assembled here.
All repeat, they use 'probable' cause from an 'unknown' informant and get a warrant. They have evidence or anything to link anyone, just a person, with no proof who could have a vendetta against them.
If the "property" is the weed, don't expect to get it back. If the property is something else, go back to court to get it. It's that simple.
No one is talking about getting drugs back bud. And it's not as 'simple'as just going to court. What if you dont have the money or time to fight it? read this article
I haven't the time nor the inclination to spell out every aspect of the case law and statutes for the past 200 years as to why that interpretation prevails. Trust me, it does. It is much more extensive (not to mention binding) than the notes and quotes you've assembled here.
Ok you dont even take a stab at this, nor do I want to hear your court reviews of the New Deal, but just answer me this. Why the need for the 18th and 21st amendment?
Okay, I'll bite: Why do we have the Eighteenth and Twenty-first Amendments?
Goggle isn't perfect. Try using books, as refference. There are several interesting tomes, written at thge time and after, which discuss " dope gangs " , in America.
Oooo---not the dreaded "sarcasm" tag.What labels? I asked you if you were a New Dealer, and you said you were. End of story. Do you think FDR got a raw deal on his court packing plan, too?
I have no respect for someone who claims to be a conservative and claims to endorse conservative principles, and then turns a blind eye to socialism and big government when it's issue-convenient.
The 18th Amendment banned "intoxicating liquors." But IF the federal government now has the authority to ban other drugs, it already had the authority to ban booze before the 18th Amendment was passed---so why did prohibitionists bother to pass it?
Yeah, right. Show me any reference to the "substantial effects" test applied to the Commerce Clause to enable federal regulation of intrastate commerce prior to 1937. For that matter, show me any reference to the clause itself that interprets "regulate" to mean anything other than "to keep in good working order" prior to that. You can't defend the current interpretation of the Commerce Clause without defending the "living, breathing document" doctrine of the liberals that says the Constitution means whatever we want it to mean.
What in the world does this have to do with what I stated. Besides, pot isn't hazardous. You can't OD from it.
The DEA's Administrative Law Judge, Francis Young concluded: "In strict medical terms marijuana is far safer than many foods we commonly consume. For example, eating 10 raw potatoes can result in a toxic response. By comparison, it is physically impossible to eat enough marijuana to induce death. Marijuana in its natural form is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man. By any measure of rational analysis marijuana can be safely used within the supervised routine of medical care.:
Source: US Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Agency, "In the Matter of Marijuana Rescheduling Petition," [Docket #86-22], (September 6, 1988), p. 57.
Commissioned by President Nixon in 1972, the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse concluded that "Marihuana's relative potential for harm to the vast majority of individual users and its actual impact on society does not justify a social policy designed to seek out and firmly punish those who use it. This judgment is based on prevalent use patterns, on behavior exhibited by the vast majority of users and on our interpretations of existing medical and scientific data. This position also is consistent with the estimate by law enforcement personnel that the elimination of use is unattainable."
Source: Shafer, Raymond P., et al, Marihuana: A Signal of Misunderstanding, Ch. V, (Washington DC: National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse, 1972).
When examining the medical affects of marijuana use, the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse concluded, "A careful search of the literature and testimony of the nation's health officials has not revealed a single human fatality in the United States proven to have resulted solely from ingestion of marihuana. Experiments with the drug in monkeys demonstrated that the dose required for overdose death was enormous and for all practical purposes unachievable by humans smoking marihuana. This is in marked contrast to other substances in common use, most notably alcohol and barbiturate sleeping pills. The WHO reached the same conclusion in 1995.
The World Health Organization released a study in March 1998 that states: "there are good reasons for saying that [the risks from cannabis] would be unlikely to seriously [compare to] the public health risks of alcohol and tobacco even if as many people used cannabis as now drink alcohol or smoke tobacco."
Source: Hall, W., Room, R. & Bondy, S., WHO Project on Health Implications of Cannabis Use: A Comparative Appraisal of the Health and Psychological Consequences of Alcohol, Cannabis, Nicotine and Opiate Use, August 28, 1995, (contained in original version, but deleted from official version) (Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization, March 1998).
Source: Shafer, Raymond P., et al, Marihuana: A Signal of Misunderstanding, Ch. III, (Washington DC: National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse, 1972); Hall, W., Room, R. & Bondy, S., WHO Project on Health Implications of Cannabis Use: A Comparative Appraisal of the Health and Psychological Consequences of Alcohol, Cannabis, Nicotine and Opiate Use, August 28, 1995, (Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization, March 1998).
Okay, I'll bite: Why do we have the Eighteenth and Twenty-first Amendments?
No, I'm asking you. If the commerce and general welfare clause covers banning substances outright, why on earth did we go through the painful process of an amendment.
McCullough v Maryland, U. S. v Gettysburg Electric Co., Gibbons v Ogden, U. S. v E. C. Knight, Houston E. & W. Railway v U. S., Hammer v Daggenhart, N.L. R. B. v Jones, U. S. v Darby, Wickard v Filburn, Heart of Atlanta Motel v U. S., Katzenbach v McClung, U. S. v Lopez, and U. S. v Morrison.
You: What in the world does this have to do with what I stated[?] Besides, pot isn't hazardous. You can't OD from it.
I'm aware that one practically cannot overdose on marijuana.
No, I'm asking you. If the commerce and general welfare clause covers banning substances outright, why on earth did we go through the painful process of an amendment.
Let's cut to the chase: I'm not remotely interested as to why the Eighteenth and Twenty-First Amendments were passed. I recognize the fact that Congress, with help from the Supreme Court and FDR, has long overstepped it's Constitutional bounds. You're preaching to the converted here; I never said I agreed with any of it. If it were up to me, each state would be left to decide what it does and doesn't want regulated, thereby letting the people in each state elect those who agree with them and let the majority rule. That would help limit the damaging effects to those states who have decided to allow drug consumption. Those who don't like it may move.
My entire contention is that pot and the like constitutes a moral wrong. Failure to recognize this fact is to our great detriment. You say government ought not to be in the business of "legislating morality;" I say most every subject that has been legislated upon to this point has a moral component. If you care to debate upon that point I will willingly join you. I admit I was a bit misleading, and I intend to rectify that with this post.
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