MARIJUANA RULING PROVES SUPREME COURT HAS HEART

The Hippocratic Oath begins with the order, "First, do no harm."

With the Supreme Court's ruling on Tuesday, doctors can now be reasonably
sure they won't be prosecuted if they follow that dictum. The decision lets
stand an appeals court ruling that doctors may not be investigated,
threatened or punished for prescribing medical marijuana.

That means doctors in the 12 states where medical marijuana is legal can
actually talk about it with their patients, rather than skirt the subject
for fear of losing their licenses.

The decision by the court is at odds with the federal government's stance
that marijuana has no medical value at all, despite a growing body of
evidence that it can be effective in easing pain. Both the Clinton and Bush
administrations opposed state laws such as California's Compassionate Use
Act, threatening prosecution for doctors who might have prescribed pot for
their patients battling the nausea of chemotherapy or suffering from glaucoma.

It was a surprising move for the Supreme Court, but one that's a hopeful
sign the court isn't entirely without heart. The prospect of enforcing a
federal ban that several states have already rejected, at the expense, in
some cases, of the dying, was too much.

So the 80-year-old grandmother who makes pot brownies for her neighbors
dying of AIDS, the cannabis clubs where people battling cancer buy a small
period of pain-free time, are safe for now.

The California case, Walters v. Conant, involved doctors, patients and
organizations who brought a class-action lawsuit in 1997 to challenge the
Clinton administration's policy.

Imagine their surprise when the Supreme Court decided that the Ninth
Circuit Court of Appeals was right. The prosecution of doctors who
prescribed medical marijuana was a violation of a doctor's free speech
rights, not to mention a violation of basic human ones.

It is a terrible policy that forces doctors to make a decision between
their patients' lives and their own jobs.

To someone whose livelihood is to make people healthier -- or if they
can't, to at least make them feel better -- such a choice is a Faustian
bargain. But for medical marijuana opponents such as the Bush
administration, the fact that the appeals court ruling flies in the face of
politics is more important.

In its appeal to last October's ruling, the administration called it "an
unprecedented judicial intrusion on the executive branch's investigatory
authority."

Funny how the president believes fervently in government keeping its mitts
off states' business, except when it comes to morality and ethics.
Government may have no place in the free market, Bush thinks, but it sure
likes to put a foot down when it can dictate who gets to share a bed or
whether a cancer victim gets to smoke pot to keep from throwing up every day.

The court, however, recognized that sometimes federal law makes no sense,
especially in the face of weightier concerns, such as how we want to treat
each other, in sickness and in health.

The use of medical marijuana dates back to ancient times, and the American
Medical Association has long maintained that any federal ban on its use
include an exemption for medical purposes, to little avail. Congress passed
the Controlled Substances Act in 1970 and effectively cut off any funding
for research into whether those claims had substance. Studies since have
shown, however, that marijuana is an effective anti-nausea drug.

We do a pretty poor job, as a nation, in providing health care for those
who can't pay. At the very least we can try to ease someone's suffering
when we know we can, not turn it into a criminal act.

Illnesses like cancer and AIDS are hard enough to fight even with willpower
and the best of medical care. Adding a court fight to the mix is too much.
If our health care system exists to cure and alleviate pain, shouldn't we
use the tools available, even if one of those tools is a substance some
people fear out of all proportion to its actual effect?

The court said yes. And we are better for it. As doctors are exhorted to do
no harm, nor should our federal government.