GOVERNOR AGAINST STASHING HASH

On February 23, Governor George Ryan vetoed a bill that would have allowed
the University of Illinois and Southern Illinois University to grow
industrial hemp. Industrial hemp carries only trace amounts of THC
(tetrahydrocannabinols), the drug that gives marijuana users their
high. However, hemp has very strong fibers that can be used in a wide
variety of common, household materials. The universities were to study how
easily hemp could be grown in Illinois and whether Illinois farmers could
profit from hemp crops.

Ryan had several concerns, among them: the proposed study didn't do enough
to prohibit researchers from growing hemp with higher THC concentrations,
researchers weren't required to study the effects hemp crops could have on
law enforcement agencies, and the current market for hemp products doesn't
warrant an expensive research project funded by taxpayer dollars. Ryan
stated that he wouldn't even consider such a project without those issues
being addressed.

Ryan's veto statement refers to sixteen states considering similar
research, and how only one is providing government funding. He refers to
Hawaii as the only state to actually plant a test plot and New Mexico as
the only state to pay for a study with public funds.

Ryan might have forgotten about the University of Mississippi, which hosts
the Marijuana Project, the federal government's official, and guarded,
experimental stash. The project has ties to a private drug research
facility in Oxford, Mississippi, that also has permission from the federal
government to produce, among other drugs, cocaine and meth.