MR. WALTERS GOES TO NEVADA

Federal Drug Czar Campaigns Against Marijuana Initiative

Last week, we highlighted a Virginia group's effort to use open
record statutes to find out whether bureaucrats in half a dozen
states -- including Nevada -- had used public resources to agitate
against ballot initiatives that would limit the scope of government.

We await the results of that endeavor. In the meantime, Nevadans on
Thursday were subjected to precisely such an abuse of taxpayer funds.

That occurred when "Drug Czar" John Walters jetted into town and held
a news conference to denounce Question 7, an initiative on the
November ballot that would legalize the possession of small amounts
of marijuana for adults.

Keep in mind that Mr. Walters wasn't in Nevada for some unrelated
event and simply chose to express his opinion on a pending matter of
local importance. No, he came here -- courtesy of the American public
- -- specifically to influence the outcome of a Nevada ballot initiative.

This isn't the first time this has happened. Both the Bush and
Clinton administrations opposed efforts by Nevadans -- and the
residents of a dozen other states -- to legalize marijuana for
medicinal purposes.

Mr. Walters also appeared in the Silver State in 2002 and 2004 to
campaign against marijuana-related measures. A 2002 proposal to
permit possession of up to 3 ounces of pot failed miserably, 61
percent to 39 percent. Two years later, a more restrictive
decriminalization effort failed to gather enough signatures to make the ballot.

"I'm confident that once people are reminded of the importance here,"
he said, "they'll go to the polls and say no again."

Perhaps. But whatever happened to a GOP administration's commitment
to states' rights?

Electioneering on the taxpayer dime is illegal in most states -- and
should be for federal officials, too. Nevadans are perfectly capable
of weighing the issues surrounding Question 7 and rendering judgment
on their own without being browbeaten by the standard-bearer for
decades of failed federal drug policy.

Mr. Walters should have stayed home.