Did Congress really lift the Federal ban On Medical Marijuana?! This could make for a beautiful start of 2015!!!
Just last weekend Congress passed the 1,603-page federal spending measure which includes a provision that effectively ends the federal government’s prohibition on medical marijuana. Preventing a government shut down as well as ending prohibition on medical marijuana, this bill is killing two birds with one stone! Under the provision federal drug agents would be prohibited from raiding medical marijuana retail operations in states where medical marijuana is legal.
Although the Obama Administration has largely favored this approach in regards to policy, Obama also signed and passed the law last Tuesday effectively turning it into law. This also means that future administrations will not be allowed to backtrack and begin raiding medical operations again.
The relevant sections read below:
Sec. 538. None of the funds made available in this Act to the Department of Justice may be used, with respect to the States of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin, to prevent such States from implementing their own State laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession, or cultivation of medical marijuana.
Sec. 539. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used in contravention of section 7606 (“Legitimacy of Industrial Hemp Research”) of the Agricultural Act of 2014 (Public Law 113-79) by the Department of Justice or the Drug Enforcement Administration.
As Bill Piper stated, a lobbyist with the Drug policy Alliance, “The war on medical marijuana is over. Now the fight moves on to legalization of all marijuana.”
Read the full article at the LA Times!