[ OUR OPINION ]
Medical marijuana
law is well worth
court’s protectionPROPONENTS of marijuana for medical purposes have won an important round in the U.S. Supreme Court, but conflicts remain between federal law and statutes in Hawaii and eight other states that have legalized its medical use. Doctors recommending marijuana and patients using it to ease their pain must abide by strange, unwritten rules. Those precautions are necessary for patients to benefit from a worthwhile program and avoid federal prosecution.
THE ISSUE
The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to review an appeals court decision allowing doctors to recommend marijuana to sick patients.Patients using marijuana to relieve pain from AIDS, cancer, multiple sclerosis, glaucoma and other illnesses can breathe a sigh of relief because of the Supreme Court's refusal to review an appeals court decision. However, they should not expect the Bush administration to accept the decision without a fight.
Attorney General John Ashcroft proposed five months ago that Congress strip federal drug-enforcement money from police in states with medical-marijuana laws. Not only would that make a mockery of the Bush administration's avowed support of states' rights, it could dangerously cut off federal assistance to Hawaii in its battle against crystal methamphetamine.
The high court rejected without comment the Justice Department's appeal of a ruling that doctors cannot be punished for recommending or talking about the benefits of marijuana to their patients. The rejection lets stand a ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, whose jurisdiction includes seven of the nine states that have legalized medical marijuana.
The ruling does not mean doctors may prescribe marijuana. The 9th Circuit panel of judges said a doctor doing so "would be guilty of aiding and abetting in violation of federal law." Nor does is it mean marijuana may be distributed to patients. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously two years ago that the congressional determination that "marijuana has no medical benefits worthy of an exception" to controlled-substance laws makes its distribution illegal.
Instead, patients must obtain marijuana surreptitiously, i.e. illegally, or grow it themselves. Tom Mountain runs the Honolulu Medical Marijuana Patients Co-op, which helps patients grow their own. More than 1,000 patients are registered with the state to use and grow marijuana.
The Hawaii law allows a patient using it medically to possess seven marijuana plants, three of which are mature, and an ounce of processed marijuana. In California, Gov. Gray Davis signed into law on Monday a measure that limits a patient or caregiver to a half-pound of dried marijuana and six mature or 12 immature plants. Those limits infuriated California patients, whose marijuana crops had been unlimited.
Even with Hawaii's relatively low limits, Mountain and others told the Star-Bulletin's Helen Altonn that Hawaii's law is a godsend to patients. Mountain, who uses marijuana to ease pain and muscle spasms from a spinal cord injury, recommends only that the registration program be shifted from the public safety director to the state Department of Health, a move that seems logical.
