THE WRONG DRUG BATTLE

THE CAMPAIGN to legalize the medical use of marijuana has organized eight
ballot initiatives over the past three years. The Clinton administration
has opposed all of them, and all have passed. The latest test came in Maine
on Tuesday. Barry McCaffrey, President Clinton's drug czar, urged a no
vote. But a large majority said yes.

The administration fears that permitting marijuana to alleviate the pain of
AIDS and cancer may open the way to more general legalization. It worries
that saying yes to medical marijuana will muddy public education efforts
that denounce drug use. Moreover, referendums seem an odd way to make
decisions that properly belong to doctors and health regulators.

All these arguments have some merit, yet none is overwhelming. Medical use
of marijuana cannot be said to lead inevitably to drug legalization or a
pro-drug culture. Referendums can be haphazard, but voters are not the only
group supporting medical marijuana. Earlier this year the Institute of
Medicine concluded that marijuana-derived chemicals can alleviate cancer
and AIDS symptoms; it added that these chemicals would be best delivered in
a non-smoked form.

Moreover, the danger that medical marijuana would undermine the broader
anti-drug effort is receding. The first ballot initiative that passed, in
California, was flawed: Marijuana clubs sprouted, and police complained
that some members were not in genuine medical need. Since then, ballot
initiatives have been drafted so as to control access, and the drafters
have accepted further restrictions after their measures won approval in
referendums.

It is time for the administration to drop its doctrinaire opposition to
medical marijuana. It is ineffective and unpopular--both with voters and
with some law enforcers. Rather than harass doctors who prescribe
marijuana, the administration should reopen the federal program under
which, until 1991, marijuana was available to terminally ill patients.