SUPREME COURT SAYS 'NO' TO POT

In a setback for proponents of medical marijuana, the U.S. Supreme Court
ruled Monday there can be no exception to the federal law prohibiting use
of the drug.

The 8-0 decision upholds an injunction against the Oakland Cannabis Buyers'
Cooperative that prohibits the not-for-profit group from distributing
marijuana. Though Department of Justice officials refused to comment on
enforcement issues, the ruling raises the possibility that similar clubs
could be closed down. Still, the ruling is a narrow one, with the Supreme
Court only saying the clients' need for the drug is not a defense.

San Francisco District Attorney Terence Hallinan said he was disappointed,
but not surprised by the decision. A number of issues in the case --
including the right of individual states to make laws unfettered by federal
oversight -- have yet to be litigated in the lower courts. Any number of
those issues could reopen the club, said Hallinan, a longtime proponent of
medical marijuana.

At a news conference at Oakland City Hall on Monday, cooperative attorney
Robert Raich, flanked by founder Jeff Jones and Oakland resident Angel
McClary, stressed the ruling only affects pot clubs. It does not affect
individual medical users, he said.

Jones, his blue suit adorned with a small medical marijuana pin, decried
the decision as "heavy-handed and misguided."

The justices who heard the case repeatedly referred to his cooperative's
product as "medicine," Jones said. "If it's a medicine, where are they
going to get it from? People are going to have to get it on the street."
But the strongest rhetoric came from McClary, who started using cannabis in
1998 to control her anorexia and pain from her brain tumor. Without
cannabis, said McClary, 35, she would die.

"I have to tell my children that my government has given me a death
sentence," said McClary. She said she would not abide by the court's decision.

In a statement issued shortly after the ruling, U.S. Attorney General John
Ashcroft called it "a victory for the enforcement of our nation's drug
laws." But department officials refused to comment on whether it would lead
to a crackdown on other California pot clubs.

Attorneys for the club and the Justice Department faced off in March before
the federal high court, trying to somehow reconcile a federal law that
deems marijuana illegal with a California law that permits it for sick
people. The answer, penned by Justice Clarence Thomas, came down loud and
clear: it doesn't.

Quoting the federal Controlled Substances Act, Thomas said there are no
exceptions allowed for the use of marijuana. The fact it is a "Schedule I"
drug, he noted, means, under the act, that cannabis has no accepted medical
use.

The ruling ends, for now, a battle between six Northern California clubs
and the Justice Department. In 1998, the Clinton administration filed the
injunction to test the issue, and it has been slowly making its way through
the system since then.

The Supreme Court was asked to look at a 1999 ruling by the 9th U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals. That court, which sets the law for nine western
states, held that "medical necessity" superceded federal drug laws,
allowing marijuana legally to be given to patients in dire need.

As happens often enough, California is at the forefront. Though eight other
states have passed laws allowing cannabis to be used for medical purposes,
and a number of others are gearing up to do the same, pot clubs in Northern
California were the first to raise federal ire.

Because the issue before the court was so narrow, the decision does not
negate Proposition 215, the 1996 law allowing ill Californians to grow and
use marijuana. But the case will likely have a shockwave affect, indicating
how the court is leaning, and providing a clearer picture of the ultimate
fate of medical marijuana.

It is also possible that the decision will influence a case currently
before the California Supreme Court, which agreed earlier this month to
consider whether Prop. 215 provides immunity from criminal prosecution for
medicinal marijuana users.

Though this was the first medical marijuana case to reach the Supreme
Court, the law seemed headed to the courthouse almost immediately after its
passage. And that's partly due to its controversial and occasionally
outrageous proponent, Dennis Peron. Peron has been publicly criticized for
his attempts to legalize marijuana, a stance some say unnecessarily
complicates and clouds the issue. Peron, who would often light-up before
television cameras, ran against stringent medical marijuana opponent and
then-state Attorney General Dan Lungren on the 1998 Republican ticket for
governor.