SANE POLICY AT LONG LAST

Relief For Medicinal-Pot Users

Finally, there is sanity in federal policy regarding states that have
legalized medicinal marijuana, including California.

Proposition 215 -- allowing the use of marijuana for medical
purposes, if recommended by a physician -- passed overwhelmingly in
California 13 years ago. Despite that, the federal government
continued to prosecute medicinal-marijuana users and dispensary
groups. It has been able to do so because federal law outlawing
marijuana cultivation and use supersedes state law. The conflicting
laws have created a legal Catch-22 that defies logic.

Until now.

Wednesday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said the U.S. Justice
Department will not prosecute medicinal-marijuana dispensaries that
follow the laws of the state in which they operate. Although Barack
Obama indicated during his campaign that he would change the old
policy, after his inauguration, the Drug Enforcement Agency was still
raiding medical-marijuana dispensaries in states where they were
legal. Now, we presume the DEA has gotten the memo.

We hope to hear no more stories of sick people with cancer, eating
disorders, glaucoma, AIDS and other illnesses being prosecuted for
using marijuana recommended by their physicians.

As a result of 1970s drug-war policies, marijuana was listed as a
schedule 1 drug, meaning it was deemed to have no medical use. That,
despite the fact that cocaine is listed as a schedule 2 drug,
available by prescription. The schedule 1 designation for marijuana
remained even after a yearlong study in 1999 by the Institute of
Medicine at the National Academy of Science concluded marijuana's
effectiveness in treating certain ailments, including nausea and
vomiting caused by chemotherapy in cancer patients.

Last year, the American College of Physicians -- a group of 124,000
doctors of internal medicine -- called on the federal government to
ease its ban on medical marijuana.

State officials tried to finesse the state-federal law conflict in
last year's "Guidelines for the Security and Non-Diversion of
Marijuana Grown for Medical Use." In the 11-page document, California
Attorney General Jerry Brown wrote: Neither Proposition 215 nor the
state's 2004 Medical Marijuana Program conflict with the federal
Controlled Substances Act because "in adopting these laws, California
did not 'legalize' medical marijuana, but instead exercised the
state's reserved powers to not punish certain marijuana offenses
under state law when a physician has recommended its use to treat a
serious medical condition."

Not even the U.S. Supreme Court could speak straight in its 6-3 vote
in 2005 that state medical marijuana laws do not protect people from
federal prosecution. Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that the court
based its decision solely on the technical interstate commerce aspect
of the case and not the medical-necessity defense. The court punted,
saying the issue belongs before Congress.

So, after 13 years of this ongoing dilemma, spanning the Clinton and
Bush administrations, someone at the federal level at last says
something that doesn't need legal gymnastics to grasp:

Sick people in states that have legalized medicinal marijuana need
not fear being prosecuted or jailed for seeking treatment recommended
by their doctors.

Now that Attorney General Holder has articulated this welcome policy,
we hope transplant hospital administrators get the message and don't
kick any more patients off their transplant lists just because they
used medical marijuana.

Ridiculous laws can have ridiculous and tragic results.