Pubdate: Tue, 15 May 2001
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2001 Southam Inc.
Contact:  http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/ocbc.htm (Oakland Cannabis Court Case)

U.S. SUPREME COURT REJECTS MEDICAL USE OF MARIJUANA

Always Illegal - Drug Has 'No Medical Benefits Worthy Of An Exception'

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Supreme Court handed medical marijuana users a
major defeat yesterday, ruling a federal law classifying the drug as
illegal has no exception for ill patients.

By an 8-0 vote, the court decided the Oakland Cannabis Buyers'
Cooperative violated federal law by distributing marijuana for medicinal
purposes, even though state law permitted the practice.

The closely watched case marked a watershed for the U.S. medical
marijuana movement, which has been mired in legal battles since 1996,
when California approved the United States' first initiative legalizing
medicinal use of the drug.

The case pitted the Oakland club, which maintains marijuana is an
effective pain reliever for a wide range of illnesses including AIDS,
cancer and glaucoma, against the U.S. government, which had warned
against the creation of "marijuana pharmacies."

Saying the case raised "significant questions" about the government's
ability to enforce the nation's drug laws, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote
for the court that the U.S. Controlled Substances Act classified
marijuana as a controlled substance.

He said the law provided only one exception -- government-approved
research projects.

"It is clear from the text of the act that Congress has made a
determination that marijuana has no medical benefits worthy of an
exception," he wrote in the 15-page ruling.

Although the decision was unanimous, the court split on how far the
ruling should go. Judge Thomas and four others suggested medical
necessity can never be a defence to a federal drug prosecution.

Justice John Paul Stevens, joined by two others, wrote separately to say
that the court should have left open the possibility an individual could
raise a medical necessity defence, especially a patient "for whom there
is no alternative means of avoiding starvation or extraordinary
suffering."

Judge Stevens said California voters decided seriously ill patients and
their primary caregivers should be exempt from prosecution under state
laws for cultivating and possessing marijuana if the patient's doctor
recommends it for treatment.

"This case does not call upon the court to deprive all such patients of
the benefit of the necessity defence to federal prosecution," he said.

He added the ruling could lead to friction between the federal
government and states that have passed medical marijuana laws.

The court's action does not strike down state laws allowing medical use
of marijuana, but leaves those distributing the drug for that purpose
open to federal prosecution.

Voters in Arizona, Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Nevada, Oregon
and Washington also have approved ballot initiatives allowing the use of
medical marijuana. In Hawaii, the legislature passed a similar law and
the Governor signed it last year.

Medicinal marijuana advocates slammed the decision.

"The court's decision will heighten the conflict around medical
marijuana," warned Kevin Zeese, president of Common Sense for Drug
Policy. "The federal government is likely to lose when they try to
enforce this decision."

"This begs the question, what will the multitude of federal prosecutors
do in the nine states that have passed medical access laws [for
marijuana]?" asked Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the Norml
Foundation, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

"Surely the prosecutors can't hope to arrest and attempt to prosecute
individual medical marijuana patients."

Justice Stephen Breyer did not participate in the ruling. His brother,
U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco, initially presided
over the dispute.

Meanwhile, Canada is set in July to become the only country in the world
with a government-regulated system for using medicinal marijuana. The
proposed program creates three categories of potential users if they can
prove it eases their symptoms. The proposal, unveiled last month, has
attracted little criticism.
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