Renewed war on marijuana spurs Congress to defend federalism: New at Reason
Next week’s budget showdown will include a fight over an amendment prohibiting the DOJ from preventing states from legalizing medical marijuana.
Steven Greenhut writes:
Those who advocate a safe, regulated and legal climate for marijuana sales and use were unquestionably alarmed by the elevation of anti-marijuana crusader Jeff Sessions to attorney general. Public opinion polls show strong and growing nationwide support for legalization. In California, medical marijuana has been legal for 21 years and remains about as controversial as any other form of prescription medication.
During a Senate hearing in 2016, Sessions, then a Republican senator from Alabama, said, “We need grown-ups in charge in Washington to say marijuana is not the kind of thing that ought to be legalized, it ought not to be minimized, that it’s in fact a very real danger.” His follow-up comment—that government officials need to send the message “that good people don’t smoke marijuana”—has often been quoted as Sessions, now the U.S. attorney general, attempts to put his views into action.
Most significantly, Sessions revoked the Obama-era Cole Memorandum—a 2013 missive penned by former Deputy Attorney General James Cole that provided guidance for federal prosecutors in light of state legalization laws. The nonbinding memo provided some assurance that the feds wouldn’t crack down on states if their laws met a few standards, such as preventing distribution to minors and keeping revenues from funding drug cartels.
But a funny thing happened on the way back to a 1980s “War on Drugs” approach to marijuana this time around: Congress got its hackles up. Marijuana businesses complained loudly, of course. But “Capitol Hill screamed just as loudly,” reported Politico. “And it wasn’t just the Democratic members of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus. It was Republican senators, too.”
