Pubdate: Fri, 12 Oct 2012
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2012 The Washington Post Company
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/mUgeOPdZ
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491
Author: Sari Horwitz

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SILENT ON MARIJUANA INITIATIVES

Measures in 3 States Would Legalize Sale of Drug for Recreational Use

Voters are set to cast their ballots in three Western states next 
month on whether to legalize the sale of marijuana for recreational 
use, initiatives that would directly violate federal law but that 
have drawn only silence from the Justice Department.

Despite the urging of drug enforcement experts, officials in 
Washington have not said how the federal government would deal with 
possible state laws in Colorado, Washington and Oregon that would 
conflict with the federal Controlled Substances Act. Federal law 
prohibits the production, possession and sale of marijuana and 
classifies marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug, putting it in the same 
category as LSD and heroin.

Nine former administrators of the Drug Enforcement Administration 
wrote a letter last month to Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., 
urging him to publicly oppose the ballot initiatives that, if passed, 
would make the states the first in the nation to decriminalize 
marijuana for recreational use by adults.

"To continue to remain silent conveys to the American public and the 
global community a tacit acceptance of these dangerous initiatives," 
wrote the former administrators, who oversaw the DEA under both 
Democratic and Republican presidents from 1973 to 2007. "We urge you 
to take a public position on these initiatives as soon as possible."

Holder has not responded to the letter. The former officials are 
planning to hold a news conference Monday to press their concerns 
more publicly.

"The Justice Department should speak out ahead of the ballot 
initiatives to avoid immediate court action," said Peter Bensinger, 
the DEA administrator from 1976 to 1981. "The initiatives will be in 
direct conflict with federal law, international treaty obligations 
and Supreme Court rulings."

The Justice Department can file suit to try to block state laws that 
it deems to have violated federal statutes. It did that, for example, 
after Arizona passed a law in 2010 that the state said was aimed at 
cracking down on illegal immigrants but that the Obama administration 
believed was unconstitutional. In other cases, officials have simply 
made the Justice Department's stance clear ahead of ballot 
initiatives, as Holder did in 2010 when he said that officials 
opposed a California measure to legalize marijuana.

But with the upcoming initiatives over legalization, Justice 
Department spokeswoman Allison W. Price said the department would not 
comment. "We are not going to speculate on the outcome of various 
ballot initiatives state by state," she said.

Colorado's measure, known as Amendment 64, is the most likely to 
pass, according to observers and local polls. Under the measure, 
retail stores would be allowed to sell marijuana, and it would be 
taxed and regulated like tobacco and alcohol.

Growing operations would be legalized, as would "infusion factories" 
that could blend marijuana into brownies, candy bars and lollipops, 
according to Tom Gorman, the director of the federal Rocky Mountain 
High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area.

"If this passes, Colorado would have the most liberal marijuana laws 
in the developed world, more liberal than the Netherlands," said 
Gorman, whose group brings together local, state and federal law 
enforcement officials. "It's illegal for a state to pass a 
constitutional measure that allows its citizens to violate federal law."

The initiative has the support of 51 percent of state voters, 
according to a poll conducted for the Denver Post. More than 300 
physicians in the state have joined the campaign for legalization.

"As physicians, we have a professional obligation to do no harm," 
Bruce Madison, former associate medical director of the faculty at 
the University of Colorado School of Medicine, said in a statement. 
"But the truth is that the Colorado marijuana laws do just that, by 
wasting hundreds of millions of dollars in a failed war on marijuana, 
by ruining thousands of lives by unnecessary arrest and 
incarceration, and by causing the deaths of hundreds of people killed 
in black-market criminal activities."

In a letter to President Obama, four former White House drug czars 
said the administration's "non-discussion" stance "is sending a 
message that you and your administration are indifferent to the 
legalization issue."

"We stand united against any efforts . . . to legalize marijuana or 
any other currently illegal substances and urge you to respond . . . 
expressing unequivocal opposition to marijuana legalization generally 
and these initiatives specifically," the former National Drug Control 
Policy directors wrote.

Along with the Colorado ballot proposal, Initiative 502 in Washington 
and Measure 80 in Oregon would allow people who are 21 and older to 
buy marijuana from shops regulated by the state.

All three ballot initiatives are a step beyond the laws that have 
legalized marijuana for medical purposes. Starting with California in 
1996, the District and 17 states, including the three with these 
ballot proposals, have passed laws making it legal to manufacture, 
distribute and possess marijuana for such purposes. Arkansas has a 
similar measure on the ballot this year.

In 2009, David Ogden, then the deputy attorney general, wrote a memo 
to U.S. attorneys, advising that the prosecution of significant 
traffickers of illegal drugs, including marijuana, remained a core 
priority. Marijuana distribution was the largest source of revenue 
for the Mexican cartels, Ogden said.

But he also addressed the growing number of states legalizing 
marijuana for medicinal purposes.

"Prosecution of individuals with cancer or other serious illnesses 
who use marijuana as part of a recommended treatment regimen 
consistent with applicable state law, or those caregivers . . . who 
provide such individuals with marijuana, is unlikely to be an 
efficient use of limited federal resources," Ogden wrote.

Last year, in a memo to U.S. attorneys, Deputy Attorney General James 
M. Cole reiterated Ogden's position on medical marijuana but 
indicated that there was a growing increase in the scope of 
commercial cultivation, sale, distribution and use of marijuana for 
"purported medical purposes."

"The Ogden Memorandum was never intended to shield such activities 
from federal enforcement action and prosecution, even when those 
activities purport to comply with state law," Cole wrote.

In recent months, federal authorities have cracked down on the sale 
of marijuana from dispensaries near schools.

The DEA warned in August that about two dozen marijuana dispensaries 
operating in school zones in Washington state would face possible 
prosecution if they didn't shut down. That same month, U.S. Attorney 
John Walsh in Colorado sent out 10 letters to medical marijuana 
dispensaries within 1,000 feet of schools, ordering them to close.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom