MEDICAL MARIJUANA USE ONCE WAS LEGAL

The Ocean County Observer's Readers Viewpoints letter by Ronald D. Ray
entitled "Stop censoring American history in schools" made some good
points, but was sadly inaccurate concerning American history.

Ray states, "America's rights do not come from government as they do in
communist countries, but rather from God," and that "those basic rights
cannot be taken away by the government."

While I agree that things such as our right to life should not be able to
be given or taken away by our government, it's simply not true that our
government cannot do this.

I'm not talking about the right to be born.

I'm talking about our right to life.

My parents were born in a country that had never questioned the "God-given
right" to use the medicinal plant that we call marijuana. That country is
the United States of America. We had that right until our noncommunist
government took it away in 1937. God gave us this plant for a reason, and
our government took it away. It decided that God was wrong to give us this
plant for medicine.

What amazes me is the people who profess to be closest to God never, and I
mean never, pray to him about marijuana and our policy concerning its
medical use.

They are also usually the most rabid supporters of our policy of denying
terminally ill Americans the right to their own life concerning their use
of marijuana as medicine.

God-fearing people don't want to be saying that God told them marijuana
wasn't to be used as medicine.

On the other hand, I pray to him often about medical marijuana.

That is why I am able to write this, and he saw it was good.

JIM MILLER

Toms River