POT MEASURE WOULD TEST COURT RULINGS

JUNEAU--Stymied by the courts, Alaska's governor is looking for other ways
to toughen Alaska's anti-marijuana laws.

Pot laws are looser in Alaska than just about anywhere else in the country.
Possessing small amounts of the drug for personal use is a privacy right
protected under the state's constitution, the Alaska Supreme Court has
upheld. Alaska is one of 11 states that allows the use of medical marijuana.

Republican Gov. Frank Murkowski wants state lawmakers to re-criminalize the
drug, asking them to consider evidence of the marijuana's dangers that he
contends should trump the right-to-privacy rulings.

The "Alaska Supreme Court has shown an unwillingness to reconsider the
latest scientific evidence on the harmful effects of marijuana," Murkowski
wrote to Senate President Ben Stevens in introducing his proposed
legislation. "A rational evaluation of marijuana's harmful effects must
occur, and the Legislature should do that--not the courts."

The state's marijuana laws have been shaped by 30 years of court decisions
and voter referendums. In 1975, the state Supreme Court made it legal for
adult Alaskans to possess a small amount of marijuana in their homes for
personal use in the case of Ravin v. State.

In 1990 a successful voter initiative criminalized all amounts of pot. Then
in 2003, the Alaska Court of Appeals reversed that in the case of North
Pole resident David Noy. The court said privacy rights guaranteed in the
Alaska Constitution can't be taken away by voters or legislators.

The Supreme Court declined the state's request last September to reconsider
the Noy case, setting the legal possession limit at 4 ounces of marijuana.

Bill Satterberg, the Fairbanks attorney who filed the Appeals Court
petition in the Noy case, says the debate has swung from one side to the
other, but the appellate court's decision in Noy strikes a balance.

And in November, a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana and possibly tax
it similar to alcohol and cigarettes failed to pass with 44 percent of the
vote.

"I think the pendulum has swung to too permissive--the (legalization
initiative) was too permissive, in my opinion," Satterberg said. "Then it
swings the other way, and it is too restrictive."

Murkowski's bill would make possession of 4 ounces of marijuana or more a
felony, and possession of up to 4 ounces a misdemeanor.

Current law makes it a misdemeanor to possess up to a half-pound of marijuana.

But most importantly, one of the bill's authors contends, going through the
Legislature will allow a weighty body of evidence on the dangers of
marijuana to be entered into the record.

The state can take the record of evidence back to the courts, where such
information was missing when earlier rulings were made, said Dean Guaneli,
chief assistant attorney general.

The hearings spurred by the bill will allow the state to enter evidence
that marijuana poses a threat to public health "that justifies prohibiting
its use and possession in this state, even by adults in private," the
bill's language says.

That way, the courts will be able to look at that evidence the next time
the privacy issue is considered in a marijuana case.

"The first thing the courts do is look to the legislative record," Guaneli
said. "If the legislative reasons are better, the courts' constitutional
analysis will change."

Satterberg said he doubts the state's efforts to re-criminalize marijuana
are a good use of resources, saying there are better things to do than
debate marijuana's effects. The bill, if it passes, would raise police and
court costs, and make instant felons out many Alaska residents, he said.

But he can see the Murkowski bill passing through the
Legislature--lawmakers may be reluctant to be seen as coming out in favor
of drugs, he said.

"The problem is, it's a mother, God, apple pie thing," he said.

Tim Hinterberger, a University of Alaska Anchorage professor and one of the
campaign organizers of the failed initiative to legalize marijuana, said
lawmakers should consider that 134,647 voters supported the measure in
November.

"I'm hopeful that our legislators are a bit more in tune with the will of
the people than that," he said. "I don't think the momentum is on the side
of returning to prohibition."

Guaneli said he believes Murkowski's bill will pass and be upheld in the
courts, ending the state's 30-year debate over privacy and pot.

"I think once the courts say the Legislature has good grounds for doing
this, the issue will be put to rest," he said.