Link to the opinion in the above case, Gonzales v. Raich here.

I'm really shocked that Thomas didn't vote with Scalia.

'Tis a rare thing indeed.

Oregon Budget Surplus From Medical Marijuana

it will only be a matter of time before money speaks louder than words. I also just saw an article of a reform group funded study by an economist showing that legalizing it would increase the budget of states by like 15 mil.

It was inevitable that this would come down to the feds. But, you know, maybe the war on terrists is more important.

I applaud Rehnquist and Thomas for their dissent.

nice rhetoric. ever think of being a politician?

Man that sucks -bong hit-

When has america become the snob of the world is what I want to know. My views may be a bit bais since I've been smoking pot for.. woo.. a long time, but I don't see the problem behind smoking pot. Originialy it was outlawed for reasons that turned out to be completely bullshit. It's one of the few illegal drugs that isn't processed by man as well. Only thing you do is grow, dry an smoke. No MSG added! Granted Shrooms probably should be legal but hey Pot is your friend!

As for the medicinal use of it... bet if pot cured cancer(just an example ) they wouldn't have a problem with it. I think it all comes down to the federal goverment not wanting to admit that it was wrong.

[Edited on Jun 06, 2005 12:30PM]

[Edited on Jun 06, 2005 12:31PM]

In other news, recent governement studies have shown that you lose 3 IQ points everytime you smoke a joint.

I don't have time to read the decision, can anyone summarize for me whether the written decision actually touched on the commerce clause challenge at all? If so, what was their rationale for including home-grown marijuana as an interstate commerce issue?

Yeah, the decided it pretty much right along commerce clause lines. They drew the conlcluscion the medicinal marijuana has a significant aggregate interstate effect to implicate the commerce clause. Wickard v. Filburn (U.S. 1942) was used as the Court's main dispositive precedent. Wickard states that

and

They distinguished this case from U.S. v Lopez and U.S. v. Morrison, which I thought pretty much nipped the commerce clause in the bud, but evidently not.

Justices O'Connor, Rehnquist, and Thomas all dissented on the grounds that the state's traditional police power should be dispositive in matters of public health, safety, criminal law, etc. The dissent thought Congressional power here was too broad, and that the majority's definition of "economic activity" goes well beyond precedent. They found no distinction between Lopez and Morrison.

[Edited on Jun 06, 2005 by dead_ringer]

Yes, the decision discussed only the commerce clause. Well, the commerce clause and the necessary and proper clause to be exact. I assume you ask b/c the result seems inconsistent w/ the two recent cases in this area, Morrison and Lopez, where the Court struck down the Violence Against Women Act and a gun law that prohibited possession near schools. In this case, two justices--Kennedy and Scalia--switched sides and said that although the federal government can't regulate guns near schools and violence against women, which are solely intrastate activities, it can regulate home-grown medical marijuana for personal use.

The funny thing is, when I started reading the opinion I was looking forward to laughing at Scalia's hypocrisy. But it turns out I think he's actually right (well, more accurately I think Lopez and maybe Morrison were wrong too, but the fact that Scalia, who wrote a concurrence, wants to limit their holdings is correct). More to come ...

I noticed that too. It is funny that Morrison and Lopez (which I agree are incorrect) have been limited by this decision.

The majority and Scalia actually each offer pretty persuasive reasons for distinguishing this case from Morrison and Lopez. The majority says that Morrison and Lopez struck down entire statutes b/c those statutes, in their entirety, sought to regulate purely intrastate activity, while here, as in the Wickard case, you have a statute that, as a whole, no one disputes Congress had the power to enact. in other words, Congress had the power to regulate controlled substances (whether used for medicinal purposes or not) in general, and the fact that some "trivial" applications may be intrastate doesn't change that. The scheme, as a whole, is still valid and the Court won't strike down just one part of it as applied in some circumstances.

Scalia says that all of the cases (Wickard, Lopez, Morrison, this case) are consistent in saying Congress is allowed to regulate purely intrastate activity--even noneconomic intrastate activity--as long as it is necessary and proper to do so in regulating interstate commerce. In other words, it all comes down to what is necessary and proper, and, presumably, if Congress is trying to regulate noneconomic activity (as it did in all four of these cases) it's harder, but not impossible, to show that the activity "substantially affects" interstate commerce, which is the test. To him, possessing a gun near a school or committing an act of violence against a woman have little to nothing to do with interstate commerce or, more importantly, any scheme to regulate interstate commerce, while allowing people to grow marijuana for their own use (even if only for medicinal purposes) would have an effect on Congress's regulation of controlled substances in general, namely, it would undercut the federal effort to regulate such substances (since, for example, it is basically impossible to tell pot grown for home use apart from pot grown to be sold in interstate commerce, and since marijuna is a fungible commodity (which presumably sets it apart from, for example, violence against women).

As I said, I think at least Lopez and possibly Morrison were probably wrong (although I'd have to go back and look at them to see for sure), and it's encouraging to see that the Court has decided to limit them to a fairly narrow set of facts.

This is from my quick review of the case. Please correct me if I missed/misinterpreted stuff.

The federal government has long had jurisdiction over the states where drugs are concerned. Individual states can often increase restrictions on particular drugs, but they can't depart entirely from the federal government. A lot has changed since the days of decriminalization in the 1970s.

If medical marijuana is to be legalized, it'll have to be the result of action in the US Congress. I don't know whether that is possible or not. I wouldn't totally discount it, though, because there is a lot of public sentiment in favor of it. The fact that this issue has been thrown to a single body will, I think, focus attention there.

There are still states (like AK) that simply won't prosecute certain offenses. In Alaska, the state supreme court has ruled that privacy prevents certain types of searches for marijuana - and perhaps other drugs. The basis for this is that Alaska's state constitution provides and explicit right to privacy, unlike most other state constitutions.

If you need medical marijuana, you can probably get it, unless you live in a particularly marijuana-unfriendly environment - in which case you might consider moving. Health and quality of life is more important than where you live in most cases, I think.

Maybe medical marijuana advocates can actually get something done by unifying their efforts at the Federal level. State actions were always going to be an uphill battle - no matter which party is in charge. Bear in mind that AZ is a conservative state, and so is AK. The resistance to decriminalization of drugs is spread across the entire population.

[edit] The AK Supreme Court did uphold the decision.

[Edited on Jun 06, 2005 by joe_n_bloe]