cannabisnews.com: MMJ Question Must Go Through Legislature 





MMJ Question Must Go Through Legislature 
Posted by FoM on November 12, 2000 at 10:44:15 PT
By Geoff Dornan, Appeal Capital Bureau Chief
Source: Tahoe World 
Despite an overwhelming approval by Nevada voters Tuesday for medical marijuana use, the state's penalties for possession - the nation's toughest - remain in effect. The state Attorney General's Office, the Legislative Counsel Bureau's legal director and local district attorneys want tourists who rely on marijuana to ease symptoms of their illness to know nothing has changed yet . 
In fact, Legislative Counsel Brenda Erdoes said, until the Legislature, which meets next year, enacts specific rules on the subject, Nevada still has the nation's toughest potential penalties for possession. Most possession arrests are reduced to misdemeanors and with counseling ordered but, unlike most states, possession of any amount of pot in Nevada can be treated as a felony with a penalty of up to six years in state prison. Voters in 1998 and 2000 supported permitting medical uses for marijuana by 2-1 margins. "It's not self-executing," said Erdoes. "It requires legislation to take effect." Washoe District Attorney Dick Gammick, who adamantly opposes legalizing any uses for marijuana, says it would be unwise for someone from states which permit medical uses of marijuana to assume they can walk down a street in Reno or Carson City with joint in hand, protected by a prescription. "It's illegal. And that's the way we have to treat it," Gammick said. A Moreno, Valley, Calif., man found that out three years ago in Carson City when he was arrested despite having a medical reason for using marijuana - he suffered from cancer. Douglas Burton was charged by Carson District Attorney Noel Waters and taken to court. The charge was later dismissed at Waters' request, but he did so making sure that no precedent was set. And Waters made it clear other users of medical marijuana should assume it's illegal in Nevada until the statutes are changed. Erdoes said what will be legalized by the popular vote and how the system will work must all be worked out by the Legislature. She said the voter-approved initiative is in no way designed to make all marijuana use legal; it will be limited to medical uses. She said several lawmakers have already called for advice, and her office is researching the issue. "What we've looked at so far are potential provisions and what California, Oregon and Washington have done," she said. "And we're looking at the litigation, particularly between the feds and California." There is litigation between the federal government and California over cannabis clubs and distribution centers. California physicians have sued the federal government to clarify their rights. Federal authorities have threatened to strip any doctor who prescribes pot of his right to issue any medical prescriptions. "It's just a big spongy mass out there," Erdoes said. She said her job is to provide lawmakers with all the legal background and analysis she can when the 2001 Legislature opens its doors in February, but she doesn't know what form laws governing medical marijuana will take in Nevada. "That's up to the legislators," she said. Those legislators will get some advice from a variety of sectors, including physicians who want to make sure they are protected from legal action, the pharmacy board and advocates. Gammick said they're also going to hear from him. "I think this is something this state is going to regret doing and in a big way," he said. "I talked to a lot of DAs in California and they're having an absolute nightmare with it." He said he'll recommend lawmakers find that medical marijuana is already available to those who need it in a pill called Marinol available from pharmaceutical companies. "The only difference is they don't get the intense high from Marinol," he said. Users, however, have said for years that Marinol has almost no effect on the symptoms they want to relieve where smoking marijuana gives powerful relief for cancer patients, those with immune diseases such as AIDS, health problems that prevent them from eating enough to maintain health and even certain disorders that result in severe anxiety and other mental problems. Gammick says it's a sham. "They're pulling on the sympathies of people to get this through and it was totally dishonest," he said. "This just makes it that much more available and acceptable to our kids. That's what's wrong with it." One agency trying to keep a low profile at this point is the Attorney General's Office. Assistant Attorney General Tom Patton said at this point, the law remains exactly what it was before the election and that visitors need to know marijuana possession is illegal. Complete Title: Marijuana For Medicinal Use Question Must Go Through Legislature To Be EnactedNewshawk: AnonSource: Tahoe World (CA)Author: Geoff Dornan, Appeal Capital Bureau ChiefPublished: Sunday, November 12, 2000 3:56 AM Copyright: 2000 Tahoe WorldAddress: P.O. Box 138, Tahoe City, CA 96145Fax: (530) 583-7109Contact: world tahoe.comWebsite: http://www.tahoe.com/world/Forum: http://www.tahoe.com/community/forum/Related Articles:Nevada Joins Trendshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7633.shtml2 Issues Show Flip Sides of Nevada Politics http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7596.shtmlNevada Voters: Question Unlikely To Influence Racehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7498.shtmlPoll Show Nevada Voters Likely To OK Marijuana Use http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7226.shtml CannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archives:http://cannabisnews.com/news/list/medical.shtml
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Comment #6 posted by kaptinemo on November 13, 2000 at 05:15:19 PT:
They *will* care. Indeed, they will.
Many of you have some sense of history. Partly because you lived through a lot. So I think many of you would nod your heads in agreement when I say that we are treading a path that's already well trod.Look back and think: what was the attitude of law enforcement to anti-segregation laws? To civil rights legislation? For the most part, even in the North, it was hostile. Very hostile. Hostile enough for law enforcement to use their official offices to attempt to dissuade people from registering to vote. To prevent people from exercising their right of free speech and assembly. Even to the point of *killing* those who strove for the equal application of Constitutional rights.The parallels are obvious. Cannabis users have been harrassed, imprisoned, their voices illegally silenced through law enforcement's efforts to deny us our rights of free speech and assembly. And, in Peter McWilliams's case, that 'silence' was final; he was killed by law enforcement as surely as if a cop had put his service automatic to McWilliams's head and pulled the trigger. The survivors of the (ha-ha) 'Justice' system have seen their sovereign franchise as voters stripped from them purely because their choice of medicine is not on an FDA-approved list. The last matter alone is proving to have national consequences which only a few political luminaries had the foresight to warn against. The Democrats in particular are today suffering from the fiasco caused by disenfranchising huge numbers of their natural constituency, the minorities. Al Gore, with his silence on this mass disenfranchising, may well pay the price for his sloth in this matter by losing the White House. The lingering echo of the original racist DrugWar legislation of 86 years ago still reverberates today, and may have cost the Dems the Presidency. But few of them will admit that; having been active accomplices in the greatest expansion of the DrugWar in it's near nine decades of ignominious failure, they are hardly going to stand up and sing their mea maxima culpas.Yes, make no mistake, we are fighting for *our* civil rights, this time. Not ours as a group, but ours as a Nation. No matter what color, we are all in the salad this time. And the sooner we get around to thinking like that and acting like it, the sooner the LEOs will back off. Because (and as much as I hate how litigious a society we have become) with enough damaging lawsuits taking pieces of the budgetary arse out of police departments for failing to adhere to the will of the people, they'll soon come around.They will, too. As someone here put it so well, 'Beware the fury of the patient man'. 70 Million patient people. But many are dying and will no...longer...wait.
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Comment #5 posted by Frank on November 13, 2000 at 04:52:41 PT
They Void Your Vote
Voting seems to make no difference. What ever the people vote for the politicians void and they call America a democracy.  The don’t care about anyone’s health or wellbeing just their political power. The people of Nevada voted 2 to 1 for the medical use of marijuana and the system is poised to void the election. So much for the high school civics lesson that told us that if the people wanted to change the law all they had to do was vote – not so! I used to wonder why the people in foreign countries overtook the political seats of power and hanged their political masters to a lamp post. I understand now. America is no longer free. We as a people have lost ourfreedom. It's time to stand up against this oppression. 
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Comment #4 posted by Dan Hillman on November 13, 2000 at 00:58:01 PT
One word speaks volumes.
The very first word of this article."Despite"
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Comment #3 posted by MikeEEEEE on November 12, 2000 at 19:38:26 PT
Excuse Me
The anti's have painted a picture that nothing has changed.Excuse me while I barf!!! Nothing has changed? I bet they're swimming in a sea of change, I bet they really have to figure this out, first....wait, hmmm........., it will be really hard for them, since they have conditioned themselves not to think.
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Comment #2 posted by mungojelly on November 12, 2000 at 16:57:30 PT:
one can hardly expect
One can hardly expect that they're going to just roll over and say "Oh, the people voted for it? Well, then, never mind all that stuff we said. Free weed for all!" They actually BELIEVE all that stuff they said about marijuana killing children or driving negros into murderous rages or giving cancer to monkeys or whatever it is they've been ranting about lately. If it weren't for the initiative process, THERE WOULD BE NO MEDICAL MARIJUANA LAWS IN AMERICA. A mere 70% level of popular support would not have changed their position one centimeter. They simply do not care about the will of the people, any more than they care about science or common sense or harm reduction. So let's count our blessings: they ARE being forced to face this issue. The people's will has been expressed, and there is no way they can avoid coming to terms with it. 
mungojelly
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Comment #1 posted by i_rule_ on November 12, 2000 at 14:43:16 PT
Negative vibes
Does anyone else feel the hatred that exudes from these bastards because they have to allow people to have medical marijuana now? It's like they are seething with hatred. They are not ever gonna get over this message to the children thing, either. They are such chicken shits to use children as a defense when they actually have no defense at all. Marijuana is good. Plain and simple. Get used to it assholes! Stop hiding behind your children. Any other defense you may come up with will be fine. Science will prove you wrong anyway. But leave the children out of it. They are very well protected by their parents. Always have been. To still want to withhold marijuana from sick people, even after they have legally won the right to it, is totally heartless and sadistic. You people will surely burn in hell.Legalize and Realize!!
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