CLARIFICATION NEEDED FOR STATE'S MEDICAL MARIJUANA LAW

Adrian and Tecumseh city boards last week both extended their cities'
moratoriums on new medical marijuana dispensaries. It was the only
choice that makes sense as the muddle caused by the state's 2008
ballot proposal grows more and more obvious by the week. Recent examples:

- -- The Michigan Court of Appeals has agreed to hear the case of a
Traverse County man arrested for driving a car after admitting he had
smoked medical marijuana. Existing laws make it illegal to operate a
vehicle with marijuana in the driver's system. Did Michigan voters
truly intend to create an exception allowing medicated patients to
drive? Based on the proposal's ballot language, who knows?

- -- Michigan lawmakers are introducing a package of at least eight
bills to clarify some issues not directly addressed by voters in 2008.
Proposed laws would prohibit felons from being certified caregivers,
establish limits on marijuana dispensary locations, require
photographs on patient and caregiver certificates, set penalties for
physicians who falsely certify a patient's condition, require doctors
to have patients' full medical histories, prohibit driving under the
influence of any amount of marijuana, and more.

Still, since the original law was passed by voters, many of the bills
will require three-fourths majorities to enact. That may not be possible.

- -- Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette has issued an opinion that
medical marijuana cooperatives were never legalized under the 2008
ballot law. While that opinion is controversial, a reading of the
actual language of the proposal indeed shows nothing that addressed
co-ops. Did voters intend to establish them? As with driving, the
proposal created more questions than it answered.

As we noted at the time, until changes occur at the federal level,
where marijuana remains banned in all 50 states, no true legal
solution exists for Michigan's medical marijuana dilemma. We believe
the national war on marijuana -- approved decades ago by Congress and
enforced by the administration -- needs to end. And we wonder why
legalization proponents are not pressuring officials including Sens.
Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow to end it.

Until then, state officials must spend more time on a host of problems
sprouting from an overly vague ballot law, local officials must wait,
and neither can solve the federal prohibition. What voters sowed in
haste, everyone will spend years laboring to sort out.