The California Court of Appeals, Fourth District, ruled yesterday that the state law requiring counties to issue identification cards to authorized medical marijuana patients is constitutional and must be implemented by the counties.

The suit had been brought by the County of San Diego against San Diego NORML and the state of California, alleging the provisions included in SB 420, adopted by the legislature in 2003, were preempted by federal law and were therefore unconstitutional. San Diego NORML had been named as a defendant, because they had publicly threatened to sue the county if they refused to implement the patient identification cards.

In a unanimous 39-page decision issued by Justice Alex McDonald, the three-judge panel undertook a thorough analysis of the legal doctrine of federal preemption, finding SB 420 was not in direct conflict with federal law, and rejected the county’s challenge.

The court found that a local government entity “charged with the ministerial duty of enforcing a statute generally does not have the authority, in the absence of a judicial determination of unconstitutionality, to refuse to enforce the statute on the basis of the (entity’s) view that it is unconstitutional.”

The court continued, “We conclude the identification card laws do not pose a significant impediment to specific federal objectives embodied in the CSA. The purpose of the CSA is to combat recreational drug use, not to regulate a state’s medical practices. The identification card laws merely provide a mechanism allowing qualified California citizens, if they so elect, to obtain a form of identification that informs state law enforcement officers and others that they are medically exempted from the state’s criminal sanctions for marijuana possession and use. ”

The court further ruled, “Congress does not have the authority to compel the states to direct their law enforcement personnel to enforce federal laws.”

San Diego NORML is represented in this matter by Adam B. Wolfe, Esq., staff counsel with the ACLU Drug Law Reform Project out of Santa Cruz, CA.

A three-judge panel of the California appeals court in San Diego heard oral arguments on Tuesday, June 10, on the suit earlier filed by the counties of San Diego and San Bernardino against the state of California and San Diego NORML, claiming the state medical marijuana law was in conflict with federal law and therefore unenforceable. San Diego and San Bernardino Counties are appealing the earlier dismissal of their suit by a San Diego Superior Court judge, finding the state had acted properly.

San Diego NORML had been named in the lawsuit because the group had publicly threatened to sue the county for failing to implement the state’s medical marijuana law, Proposition 215 and SB 420. San Diego NORML was represented in this matter by Adam Wolfe, Esq., staff attorney with the ACLU Drug Law Reform Project based in Santa Cruz, CA.

Full Story

Best selling author, TV travel guru and NORML Advisory Board member Rick Steves continues to advance in both mainstream print and radio the common sense notion that cannabis prohibition does not work at all well and that Europe is doing a better job with overall drug policy because most of their governments don’t harass and arrest cannabis consumers—and they incarcerate hardly any offenders.

Compare that to the United States where a consumer is arrested every 38 seconds on cannabis-related charges (830,000 cannabis arrests in 2006), and, as of 2004, there were over 69,000 ‘offenders’ in jail or prison.

Update: Continued kudos in the New York Times today for Steves’ honesty and foresight regarding the urgent need for America to re-evaluate federal cannabis policies.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, in collaboration with noted travel author and NORML Advisory Board Member Rick Steves, is launching a multimedia public-education campaign to encourage communities take part in an “honest, candid discussion” regarding America’s marijuana policies.

ACLU Washington head Kathleen Taylor kicks off this new campaign with a heartfelt plea in today’s Seattle Times.

Let’s Talk About Marijuana
by Kathleen Taylor

As parents, we want to shield our children from harm and reserve certain choices for when they are old enough to understand the risks and repercussions. Certainly, this is as true of marijuana as it is of alcohol and tobacco. But just as certainly, and as most teenagers will tell you, it is easier for them to buy marijuana than beer or cigarettes. Our marijuana laws don’t work. I know it. You know it. Scores of our neighbors know it.

But no one is talking. Most of us have our own ideas about what should be done, but this has to be a decision that we make as a community. Too much is riding on this issue not to have an honest, candid discussion. Please join us in the conversation.

Read the full story here.