PART 4 - THE DEBATE: HINCHEY/ROHRABACHER MEDICAL MARIJUANA AMENDMENT

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Rohrabacher).

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of this amendment,
for two reasons. Number one, I believe in freedom. I believe in democracy
and the democratic process. If the people of 10 States have voted, I guess
eight of them have actually voted through referendum and two through their
other legislative process to legalize the medical use of marijuana within
those States, it is totally contrary to our way of life in the United
States of America to say that those States, the people of those States, do
not have a right to set their standards, their legal standards in those States.

There are dry counties, and there are wet counties. You can have a State
that is right next to one State. That is no argument. You do not have to
have one rule for the whole country. That is what federalism is all about.
And what greater use of federalism or more important use of federalism than
for people to control substances as they are consumed in their own area? I
would suggest that in my State, for example, where the people did, by a
large majority, vote for legalizing the medical use of marijuana that it is
a travesty for the Federal Government to send police into my State and
arrest people and throw them in a cage, in jail, for doing something that
the vast majority of people in my State voted to make a legal practice.
This is contrary to American tradition. This is not right. It has only been
in this last 100 years that America has decided to go haywire and create
this type of oppression which is contrary to the wishes of the majority of
people in these areas.

Number two, let us just face it, it has not worked. The process that we
have tried to use to prevent drug use has not worked. The drug war is a
miserable failure. That does not mean we should give up. I am not
advocating that. I do not advocate legalizing drugs, but I think that it is
time to take a second look at what has been going on. It has not succeeded
at all in preventing people from using drugs, and it has been a catastrophe
in the black and other minority communities where young people get thrown
into jail at an early age and their whole life is ruined. We need to take a
second look at drugs in general and how we are going to try to convince
young people not to use drugs.

By the way, I was Ronald Reagan's speech writer and I wrote almost every
one of his speeches about drugs at a time when we convinced America's youth
to stop using drugs and there was the greatest decline in the use of drugs
during Reagan's administration as any time in our history. I can assure you
in Ronald Reagan's speeches, he talked about just relying on law
enforcement was not the answer. And it certainly is not the answer in
dealing with medical marijuana that has been approved by the majority of
people in various States. Lynn Nofziger, Ronald Reagan's adviser; William
F. Buckley, the editor of National Review; Bob Ehrlich, the Governor of
Maryland, all of these people understand what this is all about and
understand that those people opposing this liberalization of the medical
use of marijuana are living in a bygone era.

Let me just note this. My mother passed away about 4 or 5 years ago. One of
the factors in my determination tonight to stand up here before you is that
I remember when the doctor told me that she had lost her appetite and I was
going to have to feed her. I was very pleased that I had voted for making
the medical use of marijuana legal because I could not look at myself in
the face knowing that I had done that to other people who were confronted
by their mother. What are we doing to someone, and they do not have to be
critically ill. What about an older person that has lost their appetite and
their will to live? If a doctor thinks it is going to help them to use
marijuana, it is immoral for us to try to put people in jail who are moving
to alleviate that type of horror that people have in their own lives.

Are we compassionate or are we not? I suggest that we vote for compassion
and freedom and support this liberalization.

Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana
(Mr. Souder).

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, it is awful when your parents get older and have
different struggles and we need to look and we have found drugs to give
them to try to address this question. That is not what this debate is
about. The gentleman from California and I have been friends for many
years. We grew up in the same conservative youth organization, Young
Americans for Freedom. We had these same disagreements when we were in YAF
a long time ago on legalization of marijuana. We had a very close vote in
the national organization. It was an organization founded by William F.
Buckley. Richard Brookhiser came up through that same organization. What we
called, and I was a more traditionalist conservative, the libertarians
believed at that time, and in many cases still do, as we heard from the
most consistent libertarian in the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr.
Paul), that drug laws are wrong and that States can nullify Federal laws. I
do not agree with that. I believe there are times when the elected
representatives of the American people can make national policy and that is
what we are debating right now. Does the Federal Government have a right to
make a law by elected citizens all across the United States that will be
upheld because they believe it protects the citizens of the United States
in the best way?

Many States conceivably could pass different laws on civil rights to
nullify some of the things we do here and other laws. We cannot operate
that way. We heard earlier today that people said on the other side that we
should support the first responders and our police forces. They are
unanimous across the country as a whole saying that they are against any
weakening of the marijuana laws with the signals they are sending. This is
a fundamental debate about what direction we are going in national drug
law. This is a backdoor way to move in. It is not about compassion. We need
to look for additional ways if Marinol does not solve it all, but it does
and in the new, improved ways it actually appears to deal with vomiting.

People can promise all types of different things. We can feel the pain, but
we should not change laws that are working. And if we want to change those
laws on the national drug policy, you should come and change the national
drug laws. It would be a travesty if this House in effect nullifies Federal
law. This is not just nullifying Federal law. The case was brought to the
Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled that the Attorney General and DEA
have an obligation to enforce Federal law.

I believe that the courts too often have usurped State authority and taken
the 10th amendment the wrong direction. This is not about that. This is
about when Congress passed a law under the Constitution that said in
interstate commerce, which narcotics move across interstate commerce, which
was not a liberal interpretation of that clause but a strict interpretation
of that clause from a conservative perspective, all except the more
anarcho-libertarians, as we used to call them, believe that in drug laws
the Federal Government historically has had the right to enforce a Federal
law. The conservative movement is not divided. We have a few of the
libertarian fringe who I respect for their opinions but strongly disagree
just as we did when we were kids; now we are grownups, and we still have
the same disagreement.

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas
(Ms. Jackson-Lee).

(Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and
extend her remarks.)

Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. I thank the distinguished gentleman from New York
for yielding me this time.

Mr. Chairman, I respect the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder) for the
work that he has done. We have traveled together. I think anyone that comes
to the floor of the House and discusses this issue obviously is not
concerned about the political liability that the headlines will read that
you stood on the floor of the House to support the free and open use of
marijuana and the promotion of drug use in the United States of America.
That is why I think it is very important to clarify the distinctive
arguments that are being made on either side. In fact, I disagree with the
interpretation of nullification when, in fact, it is an issue of States'
rights that will not be harmful to others.

I believe the Federal law is relevant when the Federal law seeks to solve a
problem that is, in fact, harmful overall to all Americans. The civil
rights example that the gentleman from Indiana used was an issue where the
United States wanted to fall on the side of what was right and end the most
heinous of behaviors in the 20th century, and that was segregation,
lynching; and so we wrote civil rights laws to give equality to all Americans.

This issue of the medical use of marijuana is a question of the patients
asking and demanding relief. I guess there is no one that can stand in the
shoes of a patient who is suffering from the horrible pain of cancer. No
one, none of us who are standing here healthy today can understand the
absolute pain of not being able either to eat or suffer through the
treatment that might be provided by normal medical procedures.

My understanding of the States that have voted for the use of medical
marijuana is, in fact, regulated processes; is, in fact, structures in
place to ensure that this is not a situation of drug running. So I do not
know why we have come to the floor of the House and not respect the
amendment that the gentleman from New York has put forward, which is to
cease the utilization of Federal funds for intervention in a process that
has been accepted by States and regulated by States. Appropriately, I
believe, the 10th amendment, leave-it-to-States, States' rights, should be
the acceptable call of the day. That should be the law.

These nine or 10 States have opted to be able to choose in their regulated
manner to allow for physicians and others to be able to prescribe marijuana
for use to be able to help their patients and to stop the pain that they
are suffering from. I cannot imagine that we would not want to be problem
solvers on this issue and take the responsible route, which is to allow
States who have been responsible in their own areas and suggested that
medical marijuana is a vital and important use.

I would hope my colleagues would see this separately from the war on drugs
when there is a great debate as to whether the war on drugs is effective. I
too am not interested in legalizing drug use, but I am interested in making
sure that the sick are taken care of and States' rights are protected in
this instance.

Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona
(Mr. Shadegg).

Mr. SHADEGG. I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Chairman, I again reiterate my opposition to this amendment. I would
agree with the gentlewoman who just spoke that each side has an argument of
merit in this debate. I compliment her for standing up and speaking out her
views. But I would say I strongly disagree.

Let us start with this whole issue of States' rights. I yield to no one on
the issue of States' rights. I have a piece of legislation I have
introduced every year in this Congress which would have required every
Member of Congress to cite in each bill they introduce the constitutional
authority, the provision of the U.S. Constitution that gives the Congress
the right to act in this area. The gentlewoman would suggest that medical
marijuana is not an area in which the Federal Government has the right to
legislate.

The implication there is that the Federal Government does not have the
right to legislate in the area of drug policy.

I would suggest that our Nation's civil rights laws, which I strongly
support, are based on the issue of interstate commerce and that
discrimination affects interstate commerce, and therefore it is appropriate
for the Federal Government to pass laws prohibiting civil rights conduct
that is offensive, including discrimination.

By the same token, clearly our Nation's laws against drugs, marijuana and
all of the others, are based on the same premise, and that is that they do
affect interstate commerce. Indeed, drug use, illegal drug use by American
workers, imposes a tremendous burden on our workforce and on our productivity.

But let us go beyond that. The argument I believe she tried to make was
there is a distinction because these laws that do not have any negative
effect, they do not do harm. I would suggest that even if medicinal
marijuana did not harm anyone other than its user, an argument I will
refute in just a moment, that premise would be wrong.

But let us look at the case cited earlier in this debate. There is a doctor
in California who has taken advantage of that State's medical marijuana law
to write 7,500 prescriptions for medical marijuana and has conducted in
doing that not a single medical exam. The reality is, this is a fraud. The
medical marijuana prescriptions which that doctor and other doctors have
written are not written for medicinal reasons. The gentleman from Texas
(Mr. Burgess) gave, I thought, eloquent testimony here on this floor just a
few moments ago in which he made it very clear that there are drugs
available to doctors today with the exact same medical and medicinal
properties as marijuana, that will relieve the pain or that will deal with
the lack of hunger or appetite, that will deal with those issues.

I want to make another point. It was interesting that in this debate one of
my colleagues on the other side said, Look, we already recognize certain
painkilling drugs and we allow them to be legal in our system, and he cited
a couple of those painkilling drugs. Why do we not allow marijuana? The
answer is, there is sound evidence behind allowing certain drugs and there
is no sound evidence behind allowing marijuana to be used for the reasons
for which it is argued.

I strongly urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment. It will, in fact,
send an inconsistent signal to our children and do grave damage to the
children of America.

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Our Federal system reserves to the States all those powers that are not
designated to the Federal Government in the Constitution. Ten States have
decided that they want to alleviate the pain and suffering of their
citizens who may be afflicted with AIDS or cancer or some other
debilitating, killing disease, and make their last days on this Earth more
comfortable by allowing them, under prescription from a licensed physician
in those States, to use marijuana for medical purposes.

The Federal Government has said "no." The Justice Department and this
administration have said "no." They are not going to allow people in those
10 States, fully 20 percent of the States of the Nation, to be relieved of
the pain and suffering under the laws of those States. That makes no sense.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, do I have the right to close?

The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf) has the right to close.

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, how much time is remaining?

The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey) has 2 minutes
remaining. The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf) has 3 minutes remaining.

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I want to thank everyone who participated in this debate. I think it is
very important that issues like this be discussed on the floor of the House
of Representatives. The fact of the matter here, in this particular
amendment, is simply this: Are we going to continue to allow the United
States Justice Department to stick its nose into the business of 10
sovereign States of this Union who have decided that they want to help
people who are suffering and dying from debilitating disease, AIDS, cancer,
and others, who suffer from ailments such as glaucoma and a whole host of
other ailments that have been found by a vast majority of the highly
respected medical associations of this country, they have found that people
suffering in that way can be relieved by the prescriptive use of marijuana
under the supervision of a licensed physician?

That is what this amendment would do. It does not open up anything else.

Some of the arguments that have been made against this amendment have
nothing to do with what this amendment seeks to achieve. It is very narrow
in its form and in its definition. It relates only to States that have
decided in their own way, either by referendum, which eight of them have,
or by laws passed by their State legislative bodies, to allow people to use
marijuana for medical purposes to relieve the pain and suffering in the
final days of their lives.

People talk about a gateway drug. Someone dying from cancer is not going to
use marijuana as a gateway drug. They are using it to try to gain back a
bit of their appetite so that they can maintain their strength and continue
to live among their family and offer the aid and assistance of themselves
to that family during the last days of their lives. Are we going to deny
people that?

That is exactly what we are doing by the present law, and that is why this
amendment is here, and I ask for its passage.

Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the remainder of my time.

Mr. Chairman, this is really a cultural issue. That is what this is all
about. It is about the culture, nothing else. The Hinchey amendment would
mean that State medical marijuana laws are the supreme law of the land.
This amendment would prevent Federal officials from enforcing Federal law
in a manner contrary to State law.

Under this amendment anyone who manufactures, distributes, or possesses
marijuana in purported compliance with State law would have immunity under
Federal law.

I think it is a big issue and I think the gentleman from Arizona (Mr.
Shadegg) and the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Souder) covered it very well.
Medical marijuana laws send the wrong message to our youth, too many of
whom do not recognize the dangers of marijuana and continue to experiment.
It is a cultural issue. It has taken the culture in the wrong direction,
and I urge defeat of the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman
from New York (Mr. Hinchey).

The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes appeared
to have it.

Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further proceedings on
the amendment offered by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey) will be
postponed.

Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

The motion was agreed to.

Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. Kolbe)
having assumed the chair, Mr. Hastings of Washington, Chairman of the
Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union, reported that that
Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2799) making
appropriations for the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the
Judiciary, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30,
2004, and for other purposes, had come to no resolution thereon.