MEDICAL MARIJUANA FINALLY GAINS GROUND

Those who favor a sensible and compassionate approach to the use of
illegal drugs in New Jersey must continually contend with a tough
bunch of hard-liners at the Statehouse.

It took more than a decade for them to win approval for a cautious
test of programs that give intravenous drug users access to clean
needles to slow the spread of HIV/AIDS and other blood-borne diseases.

And they've been trying for nearly four years to legalize the medical
use of marijuana under tight restrictions for sufferers who could
benefit from its use. Once again, they're butting heads with
legislative drug warriors for whom any policy other than banning the
stuff represents -- like the pool table Professor Hill warned the
people of River City about -- "the road to degradation."

Still, progress happens. Last week, the Senate Health Committee
approved S119, the Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana Act, to allow
chronically ill patients who are certified by a doctor to petition
the Department of Human Services to allow them to smoke marijuana as
a palliative. Approved patients would receive an ID card allowing
them to grow up to six marijuana plants or obtain the drug at an
alternative medicine center.

The bill, sponsored by Sen. Nicholas Scutari, D-Linden, cleared the
committee by a 5-1 vote, with two abstentions. After hearing
testimony, sometimes passionate, from both sides, the majority was
persuaded that marijuana appears to have significant value for easing
the suffering of victims of multiple sclerosis, cancer, HIV/AIDS and
other debilitating diseases when conventional medicine doesn't work .

Thirteen states, including Sarah Palin's Alaska, already authorize
doctors to prescribe marijuana under specified conditions. These laws
are fiercely opposed by the Bush Justice Department, which has
ignored them in its zealous enforcement of the federal ban on the
sale or possession of pot. The incoming Obama administration is
considered likely to be much less hostile, though.

What encourages advocates in New Jersey is the bipartisan nature of
the effort to bring change to the state. Although Republicans tend to
oppose medical marijuana -- Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean,
R-Westfield, cast the sole "no" vote in the Senate committee -- it
has significant GOP support, as well.

Sen. Bill Baroni, R-Hamilton, who voted "yes" on S119, told The
Courier-Post that he had spent the weekend before the committee
meeting reading literature on both sides of the argument.

"The people who are asking us to do this today, these are people who
can't play piggyback with their 3-year-old," Baroni said. "These are
people who get up every day and battle HIV/AIDS. They are people who
wonder if their chemotherapy is going to work. I can't look at those
folks and let them be perhaps the only ones who don't have the
ability to have less pain."

The bill's Assembly version, A804, is co-sponsored by Reed Gusciora,
D-Princeton Borough, one of the most liberal members of the
Legislature, and Michael Patrick Carroll, R-Morris Township, one of
the most conservative.

"There is no such thing as an evil plant," Carroll has said. "If a
doctor using his or her best medical judgment thinks marijuana is the
best thing for the patient, he or she should be allowed to prescribe
it. Use it as medical science decides it should be used."

The road ahead is uncertain. Next year is an election year, and even
though there's strong evidence that medical marijuana is favored by
the public, the issue is certain to be part of the campaign debate.

S119 has yet to be scheduled for a Senate floor vote, and A804 still
awaits hearings in the Assembly Health Committee. Still, Gusciora is
cautiously optimistic that the bill eventually will reach Gov. Jon
Corzine, who has promised to sign it.

Approval of the proposal by the Senate committee "will provide
political cover" for wavering legislators, Gusciora said. "It will
show that the sky won't fall on anyone voting 'yes.'"