cannabisnews.com: Ashcroft Order Based on U.S. Supreme Court Ruling
Ashcroft Order Based on U.S. Supreme Court Ruling
Posted by FoM on November 13, 2001 at 10:54:02 PT
By William McCall, Associated Press Writer
Source: Associated Press
Attorney General John Ashcroft has based his legal challenge to the only assisted suicide law in the nation on a Supreme Court ruling on a seemingly unrelated issue -- using marijuana for medical purposes.Last week, Ashcroft said doctors in Oregon cannot legally prescribe federally controlled drugs to hasten death. The Oregon Death with Dignity Act has been twice approved by voters and since 1998 has allowed at least 70 terminally ill patients to ask their doctors for a lethal overdose of drugs to end their lives before their pain and suffering become unbearable.
But Ashcroft said a unanimous Supreme Court ruling last May on medical marijuana forced him to reconsider whether the Oregon law conflicts with the federal Controlled Substances Act.The Supreme Court said federal drug law must be enforced uniformly and makes no exception for people to use marijuana for medical purposes, despite laws in eight states -- including Oregon -- allowing it.Ashcroft interpreted the ruling to apply to prescription drugs as well, overturning an earlier interpretation by former Attorney General Janet Reno during the Clinton administration.In a directive dated Nov. 6 and published last Friday in the Federal Register, Ashcroft said, "I hereby determine that assisting suicide is not a "legitimate medical purpose' ... and that prescribing, dispensing, or administering federally controlled substances to assist suicide violates the CSA."The day before the directive was published, the state of Oregon sued Ashcroft and succeeded in blocking his directive from taking effect until Nov. 20, when there will be another hearing on the issue in federal court in Portland.Oregon Attorney General Hardy Myers argues that Ashcroft has exceeded the authority granted him by Congress by extending a criminal law against illegal drug sales -- namely marijuana -- to the medical use of carefully controlled prescription drugs."There's a big difference -- we're not talking about illegal drugs here," said James O'Fallon, a constitutional law professor at the University of Oregon.Even if the Ashcroft interpretation is allowed, Myers argues the federal government has no business interfering in medical practice in Oregon because the Constitution gives states the right to decide some laws by themselves -- especially medical laws.Myers cites another recent unanimous U.S. Supreme Court decision, which said there is no constitutional right to assisted suicide.But he notes that same 1997 ruling also said it was up to the individual states to decide for themselves whether to allow assisted suicide. That same year, Oregon voters overwhelming reaffirmed their assisted suicide law in a statewide ballot.O'Fallon says courts and Congress also have historically given states the responsibility for regulating doctors."The great irony of this is that we are dealing both with an administration and ultimately a Supreme Court who purport to place great value on state sovereignty and states exercising control over the everyday lives of their people instead of having the federal government intrude," O'Fallon said.Rebecca Dresser, a law professor and bioethics expert at Washington University in St. Louis, said the Oregon law was an attempt to control what has become an "underground" practice of overprescribing pain medication requested by the terminally ill."We know it goes on," Dresser said. "Doctors give patients prescriptions knowing it may end their lives, whether it's legal or not."Barbara Coombs Lee, the nurse turned attorney who is one of the chief authors of the Oregon law, defends it as a way to allow doctors and their patients to decide when all hope is exhausted and pain is simply too much to bear. But the law leaves the final decision to take the overdose up to the patient, not the doctor.Ashcroft, however, states in his directive to the DEA chief that there "are important medical, ethical and legal distinctions between intentionally causing a patient's death and providing sufficient dosages of pain medication necessary to eliminate or alleviate pain."No matter how important Ashcroft considers those distinctions, Oregon State University political science professor Bill Lunch notes his directive was delayed by nearly five months after his staff recommended it in June.Lunch says the delay may have been a deliberate political ploy to avoid forcing U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., to join the Bush administration effort to undermine the Oregon law at a time when Smith may have faced a tough re-election campaign against a popular Democratic challenger, Gov. John Kitzhaber, who signed the assisted suicide bill into law in 1999.Kitzhaber decided in September not to run for the Senate.Smith is being challenged by Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, who is not seen as potent a candidate in the race as Kitzhaber would have been.U.S. District Judge Robert Jones last Thursday issued a 10-day temporary injunction barring Ashcroft from putting his interpretation of federal drug law into effect, noting the five-month delay before Ashcroft issued what Jones termed an "edict for instant enforcement."Jones warned, however, that neither side should take his language or his sharp questions for attorneys as a signal to predict whether he will decide Nov. 20 to let Ashcroft's directive stand or whether he will extend the injunction barring it until the issue can be decided by a court.Nelson Lund, a George Mason University law professor and expert in assisted suicide legal issues, says the fate of the Oregon law ultimately may not rest on the medical debate or the clash of moral and ethical principles, but instead on a simple reading of the Controlled Substances Act."I really don't think it's so much a collision of principles as it is a straighforward interpretation of what the statute means," Lund said.Complete Title: Ashcroft Order Based on U.S. Supreme Court Ruling on PotSource: Associated PressAuthor: William McCall, Associated Press WriterPublished: November 13, 2001Copyright: 2001 Associated PressRelated Articles & Web Sites:Medical Marijuana Information Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/medical.htmAshcroft's Moral Stand Out of Line http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11332.shtmlUS Marijuana Clinics Raided in Crackdown http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11328.shtmlAshcroft Ruling Blocks Ore. Assisted-Suicide Law http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11286.shtml
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Comment #10 posted by dddd on November 14, 2001 at 04:37:38 PT
Right On Tim Stone
" The "simple reading" of the CSA law will amount to whatever the geezers on the Supreme Court ultimately
decide, likely by a 5-4 vote. The "simple reading" of the Controlled Substances Act is not carved in tablets brought down from the
Mount forevermore. It's a case of ill-informed, politically-biased, morality-obsessed humans making ill-informed, politically-biased,
morality-obsessed laws to begin with. And for Prof. Lund to claim that the "simple reading" of the law has nothing to do with any "clash
of moral and ethical principles" is a real hoot. As if interpretation of solely morality-based laws, so-called "sumptuary" laws, were
ever, anywhere, based on anything _other_ than a clash of opposing moral principles. "Well stated Professor Stone!....dddd
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Comment #9 posted by johnrambo on November 13, 2001 at 20:57:47 PT
Pizza again?
cancer and pizza? why? I'll have my pizza without cancer, thank you. If you're reading this, go fire up a bowl or a good spliff. It is too bad that ashcroft is all about pain and suffering... it's not fun watching someone die from pain. Maybe he's never seen it. Wish i hadn't... oh well, smoke em if you got em
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Comment #8 posted by goneposthole on November 13, 2001 at 20:39:55 PT
death with dignity
If you have never seen anybody with a terminal illness suffer and die at the hands of the medical system, you are in for an eye opener. Chemotherapy, radioactive implants, countless medications, ad infinitum are the norm. All with the same hideous result; At a cost that is so preposterous it is ridiculous.A few years back the editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association (they must be a doctor) resigned his position in protest. His reason: The medical profession had become more or less a profession to make money.Please forgive Mr Ashcroft and Mr. Hutchinson for they know not what they do. Hate the sin, not the sinner.
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Comment #7 posted by Tim Stone on November 13, 2001 at 18:15:45 PT
Professor Lund is incoherent
"Nelson Lund, a George Mason University law professor and expert in assisted suicide legal
issues, says the fate of the Oregon law ultimately may not rest on the medical debate or the
clash of moral and ethical principles, but instead on a simple reading of the Controlled
Substances Act. "I really don't think it's so much a collision of principles as it is a straighforward
interpretation of what the statute means," Lund said."*****That's a thigh-slapper yuk. The "simple reading" of the CSA law will amount to whatever the geezers on the Supreme Court ultimately decide, likely by a 5-4 vote. The "simple reading" of the Controlled Substances Act is not carved in tablets brought down from the Mount forevermore. It's a case of ill-informed, politically-biased, morality-obsessed humans making ill-informed, politically-biased, morality-obsessed laws to begin with. And for Prof. Lund to claim that the "simple reading" of the law has nothing to do with any "clash of moral and ethical principles" is a real hoot. As if interpretation of solely morality-based laws, so-called "sumptuary" laws, were ever, anywhere, based on anything _other_ than a clash of opposing moral principles.
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Comment #6 posted by mayan on November 13, 2001 at 17:54:57 PT
Activists Detained...
Two U.S. activists heading to the G-20 meeting in Canada were detained at the border.
http://news.excite.com/news/cp/011113/17/us-activists-who
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Comment #5 posted by idbsne1 on November 13, 2001 at 15:18:25 PT
Suicide by cop?
Hey, I have an idea... if those bastards refuse to recognize Oregon's rights...I say those who want to alleviate their suffering and commit suicide... should go out, buy a gun and shoot Hutchinson and Ashcroft the way they did Tom and Rollie.... stick it to the Federal Government....those F #$n Righteous Bastards....idbsne1BTW, my deepest sympathy for those that ARE suffering... I only wish these Bastards would understand that PEOPLE are supposed to decide our laws...Do Americans know that this country is now a tyranny?
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Comment #4 posted by Cannabuzz on November 13, 2001 at 15:01:27 PT
leathal overdose,... assissted(?) what......
ya......so what'z dis talk about marijuana? ya, it's just too bad that none have ever died from a leathal dose of marijuana. THC and CBNs, CBDs,... they are mother nature's drugs and also very powerful antioxidants. Do the research, you'll see.
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Comment #3 posted by FoM on November 13, 2001 at 12:12:56 PT
Pizza and Aspirin
Oh no p4me! What a lousy way to go!
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Comment #2 posted by p4me on November 13, 2001 at 12:08:51 PT:
committing suicide
If I were to come down with cancer or whatever I would go out into the garage and start my gas gusler car. I might consider making a very small pizza with about 30 aspirin in it. I am not sure if that is a lethal dose although I would not take more than 3 at anyone time for fear of injuring my health. Actually, I wouldn't sit there and count out 30 aspirin. If I had a hundred I would eat them all. If I did not have 30 I would buy a bottle of 100 and eat them all on top of a good greasy pizza. I can not tell you how West Virginia was allowed to become a state when the Constitution says that a state may not be divided, so I do not pretend to be a lawyer. I just believe the federal government is not respecting the states rights. If the Constitution is not clear enough, I am for the debate on a Constitutional Amendment that redefines those rights even though I know it will not happen.I saw the side by side video of Reagan and George the First on the show "John Stossel Goes To Washington" where they use the same words that government is too big and spends to much. You have a Department of Education that runs no schools and publishes no books for schools. There is not a website that I can go to and call up 11th grade world history and I cannot go to the library and check out any book by the Department of Education dispite its huge budget.Besides the government being out of control, this is example of the far right trying to impose the morals of christian mythology on us all. The far right is dying off and maybe when their political influence is reduced they will not attempt such things. Ashcroft going out on a mission and what was his legal precedence for this again? "He has none," you say. I am in shock.Vote against all incumbents. Buy someone you love a vaporizer.
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Comment #1 posted by Jose Melendez on November 13, 2001 at 11:48:21 PT:
huh?
Ashcroft, however, states in his directive to the DEA chief that there "are important medical, ethical and legal distinctions between intentionally causing a patient's death and providing sufficient dosages of pain medication necessary to eliminate or alleviate pain."Sounds like a reason to use cannabis...
www.narcosoft.com
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