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Mainers
for Medical Rights
44 Exchange Street
Suite 201
Portland, ME 04101
800.846.1039
207.780.0704
info@mainers.org
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November 5, 1998 |
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| Medical
Marijuana Gains Momentum |
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By
Ulysses Torassa
EXAMINER MEDICAL WRITER
Surprise victories for medical marijuana proposals in five states Tuesday mean
California's Proposition 215 was no fluke - and the federal government will be
under pressure to change its hard-line stance, advocates said yesterday.
But officials at the White House's office of drug policy said they were unfazed
by the election results in Arizona, Nevada, Alaska, Washington and Oregon.
"It does not cause us to believe that marijuana is a safe substance," said Jim
McDonough, director of strategy for the Office of National Drug Control Policy.
"The bottom line: It's not science."
Initiative backers, though, said the votes - all significant majorities - demonstrate
strong mainstream support, which federal officials will find hard to ignore.
"I don't think anybody, especially the drug office, thought every one of them
would pass," said Dave Fratello, spokesman for the Los Angeles-based Americans
for Medical Rights, which was behind the initiatives. "This is so overwhelming,
and such a rebuke. They have to be soaking up the defeat and trying to figure
out what to do next."
The Clinton administration and its drug czar, Gen. Barry McCaffrey, steadfastly
have opposed using marijuana as a medicine, saying it is unproved, unsafe and
sends the wrong message about drug abuse to the nation's children.
AIDS, cancer, glaucoma
The initiatives, all tightly worded to apply only to people with conditions such
as AIDS, cancer and glaucoma, were well-funded, with at least $2million spent
on the various campaigns. Most of the money came from three multimillionaires,
including financier George Soros.
In each state, the measures were passing with at least 55 percent of the vote
(Oregon's absentee ballots still were being counted). In Nevada, the law requires
the initiative be voted on again in 2000 before it could go into effect.
A measure also was before voters in Washington, D.C., but a last-minute provision
added by Congress to the federal budget forbids officials there from counting
those votes. Still, supporters say an exit poll showed it winning 69 percent to
31 percent.
Eligible patients in the states where the law goes into effect likely will be
issued cards to keep them from being arrested for possessing marijuana. The measures
don't allow people to sell marijuana to those with medical needs, so patients
still will have to go to the black market, Fratello said.
In the long run, the group wants the government to reclassify marijuana from a
Schedule 1 drug, which means it has no medical use, to a Schedule 2 or 3 drug
that is regulated and can be prescribed by a doctor.
Also under consideration is a federal judge's recommendation that the government
expand an obscure, decades-old program under which eight people in the United
States are getting marijuana for medical purposes. The move could settle a class-action
suit brought against the government by people trying to gain access, but the Justice
Department has indicated it is unlikely to go along.
"Several years away"
Fratello said he doesn't expect Tuesday's results to lead the government to reverse
itself on that lawsuit, or its larger policy stance.
"It will be hard to turn the ship of state around on this issue," he said. "The
victory last night was overwhelming, but we know the solution is still several
years away."
The government could pin some incremental policy changes on an upcoming report
from the National Academy of Science's Institute of Medicine. Supporters believe
the report, at least, will call for more research, and possibly for the sanctioned
use of cannabis in medical settings.
Meanwhile, the group said it expects to resurrect an invalidated initiative in
Colorado next year, and to have one on the ballot in Maine as well. Also in its
sights are Massachusetts, Florida, Ohio, Illinois and Michigan.
"First it was California, and maybe people wrote off California as an anomaly,"
Fratello said. "Now it's the entire West, which is convincing, but it's still
not the Midwest. If we're going to continue to legitimize this, those Midwestern
states are looking like the places where we intend to go."
For supporters in California, the biggest events Tuesday were the elections of
Gray Davis as governor and Bill Lockyer as attorney general, said Jeff Jones,
director of the Oakland Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative. Lockyer supported the 1996
medical marijuana initiative, Proposition 215. During the campaign, Lockyer said
he would like to see "clinics, not cults," while current Attorney General Dan
Lungren has worked to shut down clinics in San Francisco and Oakland. Davis has
said he would not oppose the will of the California majority in passing Prop.
215.
The Oakland club's distribution activities were shut down by the federal government
this year, and the organization is fighting the move in court. |
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