RULING OVERRIDES MARIJUANA STATUTES

WASHINGTON - People who smoke marijuana because their doctors
recommend it to ease pain can be prosecuted for violating federal drug
laws, the Supreme Court ruled Monday, overriding medical marijuana
statutes in 10 states.

The court's 6-3 decision was filled with sympathy for two seriously
ill California women who brought the case, but the majority agreed
that federal agents may arrest even sick people who use the drug as
well as the people who grow pot for them.

Not passing judgment Justice John Paul Stevens, an 85-year-old cancer
survivor, said the court was not passing judgment on the potential
medical benefits of marijuana, and he noted "the troubling facts" in
the case. However, he said the Constitution allows federal regulation
of homegrown marijuana as interstate commerce.

The Bush administration has taken a hard stand against state medical
marijuana laws, but it was unclear how it would respond to the new
prosecutorial power. Justice Department spokesman John Nowacki would
not say whether prosecutors would pursue cases against individual users.

In a dissent, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said the court's
"overreaching stifles an express choice by some states, concerned for
the lives and liberties of their people, to regulate medical marijuana
differently."

The women who brought the case expressed defiance.

"I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing. I don't really have a
choice but to, because if I stop using cannabis, I would die," said
Angel Raich of Oakland, Calif. She suffers from ailments including
scoliosis, a brain tumor, chronic nausea, fatigue and pain. Raich says
she smokes marijuana every few hours.

Diane Monson, an accountant who lives near Oroville, Calif., has a
degenerative spine disease and grows her own marijuana plants. "I'm
going to have to be prepared to be arrested," she said.

The ruling does not strike down California's law, or similar ones in
Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont and
Washington state. Besides those states, Arizona permits marijuana
prescriptions but has never instituted a program to support them. In
Maryland, people accused of violating state possession laws can
present evidence to a judge of a medicinal use of the drug; the judge
could then lower the punishment to a $100 fine.

However, Monday's ruling may hurt efforts to pass laws in other states
because the federal government's prosecution authority trumps states'
wishes.

John Walters, director of national drug control policy, defended the
government's ban. "Science and research have not determined that
smoking marijuana is safe or effective," he said.

California's law, passed by voters in 1996, allows people to grow,
smoke or obtain marijuana for medical needs with a doctor's
recommendation. Monson and Raich contend that traditional medicines do
not provide the relief that marijuana does.

California battleground California has been the battleground state for
medical marijuana. In 2001, the Supreme Court ruled in a California
case that the federal government could prosecute distributors despite
their claim that the activity was protected by medical necessity.

Two years later the justices rejected a Bush administration appeal
that sought power to punish doctors for recommending the drug to sick
patients. That case, too, was from California.

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer said Monday that "people
shouldn't panic ... there aren't going to be many changes."

Local and state officers handle nearly all marijuana prosecutions and
still must follow any state laws that protect patients.

The government has arrested more than 60 people in medical marijuana
raids since September 2001, according to the National Organization for
the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Congress could be the next stop for the debate.

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OKLAHOMA TIES

A federal law enforcement official in Oklahoma hailed
Monday's ruling for keeping illegal drugs illegal. Oklahoma City U.S.
Attorney Robert McCampbell said the case initiated by two California
women had been watched closely because it could have opened the door
to the legalization of marijuana.

He said he was pleased the Supreme Court did not allow that to
happen.

McCampbell said marijuana does not have any medicinal value, as
acknowledged by the American Medical Association, Food and Drug
Administration and Institute of Medicine.

Congress came to the same conclusion in 1970, he said, when it enacted
the Controlled Substances Act, including marijuana on its list of
illegal drugs.

McCampbell said other drugs are more effective in treating people with
chronic illnesses.

"That's why physicians prescribe these drugs," he said.

Even in states that have approved marijuana for prescription use,
McCampbell said a risk is that the drug will be diverted for
illegitimate purposes, hindering the fight against illegal drugs.