Meet Hawaii’s Republican Governor Linda Lingle. On Monday, Gov. Lingle vetoed Senate Bill 1058, which called on the legislature to merely study “issues relating to medical cannabis patients and current medical cannabis laws.”

Specifically, SB 1058 called for the formation of a legislative task force to:

(1) Examine current state statutes, state administrative rules, and all county policies and procedures relating to the medical marijuana program;

(2) Examine all issues and obstacles that qualifying patients have encountered with the medical marijuana program;

(3) Examine all issue and obstacles that state and county law enforcement agencies have encountered with the medical marijuana program;

(4) Compare and contrast Hawaii’s medical marijuana program with all other state medical marijuana programs; and

(5) Address other issues and perform any other function necessary as the task force deems appropriate, relating to the medical marijuana program.

In her veto address, Gov. Lingle alleged — laughably — that the mere act of examining the medical marijuana laws of Hawaii and a dozen other states violates federal anti-drug laws.

“I am returning herewith, without my approval, Senate Bill No. 1058. … This bill establishes the medical cannabis task force … to review issues related to (Hawaii’s) medical marijuana program and make recommendations for any proposed legislation and rules. … The medical task force is unnecessary because it would attempt to deal with issues raised by medical marijuana users that can only be addressed by circumventing federal law.“

Keep in mind that just days earlier lawmakers in Rhode Island overwhelmingly approved legislation to allow the state to license nonprofit facilities to produce and dispense medicinal cannabis to qualified patients. Yet in Hawaii the Governor would have us believe that just gathering feedback from patients and local law enforcement regarding the state’s nearly ten-year-old medical cannabis program somehow violates federal law. It’s an absurd position and no doubt Gov. Lingle, who vetoed a similar task force bill last year, knows it.

Of course, the true motive behind Gov Lingle’s action — and the similar actions of her fellow prohibitionists — is to silence any sort of public or political debate surrounding America’s failed marijuana policies.

This was the motivation behind President Obama’s decision to ‘laugh off’ the issue of marijuana law reform during his online town hall this past March. Silencing free speech was also the driving force behind the actions of members of Congress who earlier this year threatened to withhold funding from the city of El Paso, Texas, if they so much as dared to hold an “honest, open national debate” regarding US drug policy. And surely this was the motivating force behind a South Dakota Judge’s decision this week to bar longtime NORML advocate Bob Newland from engaging in any public advocacy of marijuana law reform for one year. (Full disclosure: Bob Newland, under the banner of SoDakNORML, had been leading the petition drive to place a medical marijuana initiative on the 2010 state ballot. In other words, Judge Delaney’s decision isn’t simply limiting Mr. Newland’s constitutional rights to free speech, it’s also potentially limiting the voting rights of all South Dakotans.)

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Hello Bob,

I’m sorry to read of this near conclusion of your run-in with cannabis prohibition laws in SD. Like you, I’d hope to see a suspended sentence, or a lower sentence all together.

With 98% of all criminal cases being plea bargained, I’m sure this Hobson’s Choice was a difficult one to make.

Being banned from public advocacy regarding something you–and clearly tens of millions of other Americans agree should be discussed publicly–maybe the cruelest cut of all. One that I suspect is ironically going to draw more attention/media awareness to your ‘run-of-the-mill’ cannabis bust than any cannabis possession case in your state’s history (if it has not already).

You may have to remain mum about marijuana advocacy (for a year), but groups like NORML never will, and where your voice has been temporarily silenced by a system (i.e., the mechanisms of cannabis prohibition) no longer worthy of public respect in America (and South Dakota), know full well that hundreds of thousands of your like-minded friends and fellow cannabis consumers will be LOUDLY protesting the continuation of cannabis prohibition from the halls of Congress, to Statehouses across the country, to the streets and parks in protest of both a failed public policy—and against any government or court mandates that seek criminal sanctions against citizens who disagree with prohibition laws, and will not allow them to share their views with the general public.

When a simple cannabis arrest turns into government restrictions on protected First Amendment speech and right of assembly, cannabis consumers and concerned citizens need to re-double their efforts to end our country’s expensive and destructive cannabis prohibition laws.

Godspeed Bob! Please remain in touch with NORML!!

Cannabem liberemus,

-Allen St. Pierre

NORML

On 7/6/09 9:40 PM, “Bob Newland” <newland@rapidcity.com> wrote:

6 July 2009

Hello everyone;

This will be the last email I send under the banner ‘South Dakotans for Safe Access‘ at least for a year.

By now, most of you know I plead to a felony count of possession of marijuana in May. Today I was sentenced.

In an hour-long sentencing hearing, Judge Delaney waxed reminiscent as he described his admiration for Muhammad Ali’s stance against an illegal war, which cost him millions of dollars and his peak performing years, during which time he did not complain, nor did he leave the country that so abused him for his beliefs.

Then, citing the fact that he (Judge Delaney) had to account for his actions to the hundreds of kids he sees in juvenile court, he sentenced me to a year in the Penn. Co. jail, with all suspended but 45 days. During the suspended part of the sentence I will wear a bracelet that senses alcohol use and I will be subject to arbitrary piss tests by a probation officer to detect illegal “drug” use. In addition I may have no “public role” in cannabis law reform advocacy during that year.

Work release is an option, but I have few marketable skills, especially in a time when everyone else is getting laid off. I’ll follow any leads any of you might have.

It was somewhat harsher than I expected, and probably less than I deserved. At least it did not cost me a career worth millions, and my peak performing years won’t begin until July 6, 2010. And that’s about all I feel comfortable saying about it. For a year.

I’ll turn 61 in prison, doin’ six weeks for smokin’ a joint. Mama cried.
*****

I will do my time beginning sometime in August. If I have a job of the conventional sort (you know, with a time to get there and a time to leave) I can get work release. So, if you have any ideas for me along those lines?…

Thanks again to all who sent letters to the judge, and to those who have sent messages of support to me.

For 40 years I have watched as dozens of people I know–and thousands I know of–go through this same, ummm?, procedure. Now it’s happening to me, and I feel the same frustration over the purposelessness of it all as I have felt for all those other people, many, many, many of whom were treated far more viciously than I.

Someday this war will be over.

So long for now,
Bob
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