KENTUCKY FARMERS WILL SUE FOR RIGHT TO GROW HEMP

Action will be filed today in Lexington to challenge 1937 law

A group of Lexington-area farmers who have been battling for legalization
of industrial hemp in Kentucky plans to go to federal court today in
Lexington to sue for the right to grow the plant.

Hemp, which was grown historically by both George Washington and Thomas
Jefferson, was a staple crop through much of Kentucky's history, and a
viable one as recently as World War II.

But a law passed in the 1930s aimed at curbing the cultivation of
marijuana, a biological sibling of hemp that contains a high concentration
of the psychoactive ingredient THC, has been enlarged to ban hemp growth as
well.

Andy Graves, a Lexington Farmer and president of the Kentucky Hemp Growers
Cooperative Association, said there are indications hemp crops could net
Kentucky farmers $300 to $350 an acre -- somewhat less than tobacco, but
well ahead of corn and soybeans.

Graves noted that tobacco is "becoming very controversial" and there are
questions about how much longer it will remain the lucrative crop it is for
many Kentucky farmers. "We don't think a hemp crop will rival net income
from tobacco," said, "but with hay, cattle and other things it might help."

Graves said Michael Kennedy, a New York attorney, will file a suit asking
for a series of judgements declaring that the 1937 law was not intended to
outlaw hemp, that the federal government has left regulation of hemp to the
states by default, and that hemp and marijuana are legally distinct.

Burl McCoy, a Lexington attorney working on the suit with Kennedy, said
there is a Kentucky law against cultivation of hemp, but that hemp forces
have challenged it, and have won an initial victory in a case involving
actor Woody Harrelson.

McCoy said the suit to be filed today will introduce testimony from the
Congressional Record showing that sponsors of the 1937 law repeatedly
assured a Kentucky Congressman that it was not intended to interfere with
production of hemp as a crop in any way.

Graves said hemp is a multi-purpose and versatile plant, with seed that can
be converted into food, oil, animal feed and cosmetics, and fiber that can
be used in cloth, rope, carpets, construction materials and paper.

Because it can be grown much more quickly than trees and its production and
processing don't involve the environmental concerns associated with paper
from pulpwood, large paper companies have been scrutinizing hemp for some
years.

Graves said hemp can be grown without pesticides or herbicides, and can
itself be used against the threat of cyst nematodes to soybeans. In tests
in Canada where hemp has been grown in rotation with soybeans, he said, it
has reduced the effects of nematodes by 80 per cent.

Graves also is president of the Farm Bureau organization in Fayette County.
He is joined as a plaintiff in the suit by his father, Jake Graves – a
well-known Lexington banker -- and other individual farmers, besides the
association.

He said Kennedy -- whose high-visibility clients have included Ivana Trump
- -- got interested in the question through an association with Planet Hemp,
a New York store that sells hemp products.

Graves said Kennedy saw viability in a challenge of the DEA's position on
marijuana, and chose Kentucky as a good place to test it. "People here are
comfortable with hemp," Graves said. "The population knows the word. Their
grandfathers grew it. It meant good money years ago, and it will in the
future."


Checked-by: Mike Gogulski