UP IN SMOKE

Ending Medicinal Marijuana Raids Is a Belated Act of Compassion

Having Drug Enforcement Administration agents bust the sick who smoke
marijuana for such nefarious purposes as relieving the nausea of
chemotherapy was one of the more ridiculous boondoggles of the Bush
administration. Rarely have federal drug enforcement resources been
more misdirected than on these half-baked raids.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.'s instruction to federal
prosecutors to back away from cases against medical marijuana
patients is a sign that the Justice Department has finally sworn off
whatever had temporarily impaired reason in the agency.

Monday's action does not really steer the nation toward a new policy
on marijuana use. Rather, it would seem to set the stage for a more
rational approach to regulating medical marijuana.

After all, using limited federal resources to go after ordinary
people who are deemed in a number of states to have legitimate cause
to use marijuana was akin to sending the FBI to conduct mass arrests
of mattress tag cutters. Sure, it's against the law, but have police
nothing better to do?

In Maryland, lawmakers grappled with this issue six years ago and
agreed that anyone arrested for possession of a small amount of
marijuana who can demonstrate "medical necessity" gets no more than a
$100 fine. Parking tickets can be worse.

Despite pressure from the White House, Republican Gov. Robert L.
Ehrlich Jr. signed that measure into law, and somehow the state
didn't fall apart.

A pill form of marijuana's active ingredient, THC, has been legally
available as a prescription for years, but it's been found wanting. A
wrist-slap penalty for medicinal marijuana was a compromise: Maryland
didn't legalize sale or possession any more than the Justice
Department did this week.

It's not enough. If society genuinely believes in the medicinal use
of marijuana, then patients need more than the comfort of knowing
they won't make the FBI's Most Wanted List. They need to be able to
legally acquire it with a doctor's prescription.

Distribute a controlled, dangerous substance through pharmacies?
That's hardly groundbreaking stuff. Cocaine is used for medicinal
purposes, too, as are a number of other narcotics.

But to get to that point will require the federal government to not
only hold back the SWAT teams but to decriminalize medicinal
marijuana. That's an unlikely prospect considering the sharp
criticism leveled this week by Republicans at Mr. Holder's exercise
of discretion.

In the meantime, states including Maryland ought to at least toss out
the penalties. Nobody should have to pay so much as a $1 fine for
taking medicine his or her doctor has decided is medically necessary.
As Republican health care reform opponents like to say, let's not
allow government to get between patients and their doctors.