MEDICAL POT A BIG WINNER

White House Bid To Punish Physicians Is Rejected

Deflecting what might have been a lethal blow to state medical marijuana
laws, the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday turned down a seven-year effort by
the White House to punish physicians who recommend the drug to their
patients under California law.

The justices rejected without comment the federal government's appeal of
lower court injunctions that have blocked it from threatening doctors with
license revocation and other sanctions for advising pot use.

The lower court decisions were based on First Amendment free speech rights
rather than a right to get or use marijuana -- issues that remain
unresolved as states continue passing medical marijuana laws over the
federal government's opposition.

Nine states now have laws similar to Proposition 215, California's
Compassionate Use Act.

The federal-state standoff continues.

"The cultivation and trafficking of marijuana remains a federal offense,"
John P. Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug
Control Policy, said in a prepared statement.

He reminded public officials and medical professionals of their ongoing
duty to "reduce the harms caused by marijuana."

Nevertheless, said Graham Boyd, director of the Drug Policy Litigation
Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, "the cornerstone of the
(federal) government's attack" on California's medical pot law was laid to
rest.

"This is the case that involved whether that law would stand or fall," he
said. "If (the Supreme Court) had taken the case and reversed (the lower
court rulings), that would have been the end of Proposition 215."

"This is winning a case in the Supreme Court," exulted Valerie Corral, one
of the six medical marijuana patients who joined a group of physicians as
plaintiffs in the ACLU-sponsored case. "It's finally happening."

She predicted immediate benefits.

"Now patients will go to their doctors and talk about (marijuana), and if
the doctor won't recommend it, the patient will find someone who will. This
really moves us a step forward in gaining ... controls and regulations over
the kind of medicine that patients will be receiving," she said.

Corral, founder of a Santa Cruz medical pot cooperative, has been at the
center of an uphill battle to establish a toehold for legal marijuana in
the federal courts.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in an earlier Proposition 215 case that
medical necessity is not a defense against federal prosecution of pot
providers. Cases based on other patients' rights and states' rights legal
theories have been rebuffed so far by the federal courts in California and
are working their way toward the high court.

But by coincidence, the new Supreme Court decision came on the heels of
another big victory for medical pot advocates.

On Sunday, Gov. Gray Davis signed a bill setting state guidelines for
medical pot use and providing for a state identification card for patients
and their caregivers.

"Even if it's in fits and starts, these are two major breakthroughs," said
state Sen. John John Vasconcellos, D-Santa Clara, the bill's author.

The case that ended Tuesday began soon after passage of Proposition 215,
when the Office of National Drug Control Policy threatened doctors with
prosecution, license revocation and dismissal from Medicaid and other
federal programs.

Doctors and patients sued in federal court in San Francisco and won
injunctions that the government appealed.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled a year ago that doctors could
be punished only for aiding and abetting "the actual distribution and
possession of marijuana" but not for recommending it.

"An integral component of the practice of medicine is the communication
between a doctor and a patient. Physicians must be able to speak frankly
and openly to patients," wrote 9th Circuit Chief Judge Mary Schroeder of
Phoenix.

Dr. Jack Lewin, chief executive officer of the California Medical
Association, said the importance of the Supreme Court decision was that it
blocked "inappropriate intrusion into the sacredness of the
patient/physician relationship by the (U.S.) Department of Justice."

But Lewin said it did not solve the whole dilemma for doctors.

"Marijuana needs to be de-politicized," he said. He called for broad
scientific research -- not "politically motivated research" -- comparing
marijuana with other options for pain relief and nausea control.

Until that happens, he said, it will be hard for doctors to evaluate
whether to recommend marijuana.