In 2004,
62% of Montana's voters chose to legalize medical marijuana. In April of this year, led by Republicans, the Montana legislature tried to overturn the will of the people on this issue. They voted to create restrictions on the sale of medical marijuana. (SB 423) Conveniently for the legislature, just before this bill, feds raided medical marijuana facilities in the state in March.
(April 2011)
http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/montana/article_d56938bb-1f49-5534-b6ec-b8c657a411e6.htmlRepublican Gubernatorial wannabe and coffee achiever state senator Jeff Essman (R-Billings) sponsored the 2011 bill to repeal the 2004 vote.
"My reaction is, the original initiative is the unworkable mess which has created the presence of storefronts, which promoted access, brought advertising of the product to the general airwaves and print in the state," Essmann whined."
http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2011/09/montana_medical_marijuana_backers_still_hope_to_ov.phpLOLOL So, conservatives are ANTI-BUSINESS when they don't like that business. Hey, can I get elected and use my office to attack businesses I don't like, too? I mean, so what if they're legal. They annoy me.
Essmann claimed there is "clear evidence" of a supposed "negative impact" from the original medical marijuana law approved by an overwhelming 62 percent of voters in 2000. He claimed SB 423 would fix, that, saying it would work for the state but won't work for the people who chose to take part in the "commercial business of selling medical marijuana."
"If there were any such evidence, none of it was presented to the Legislature," replied attorney Chris Lindsey in the comments to KRTV's coverage. "We got the typical fear mongering, and non-experts were testifying as if they were experts.
The Gov. of Montana repealed the legislature's attempt to overturn the will of the people a week after the vote.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/13/us-marijuana-montana-idUSTRE73C6WQ20110413Then, in June, a judge ruled that the legislator's bill was not in compliance with rules regarding other LEGAL business entities.
At the same time, the judge upheld certain provisions of the bill that required greater proof on the part of patients and required them to go to more than one physician - though this bothers the judge b/c it is undermining a physician's ability to practice under legal guidelines- undergo x-rays or mri's at the patient's expense, and prohibited some actions -seems mostly taken by a guy named Jason Christ, who has used various ways to grow his business and has, apparently, been very successful. He also gave interviews on TV and made himself a public figure.
Helena District Judge James Reynolds issued a preliminary injunction against portions of a restrictive overhaul of the state's voter-approved medical marijuana law, which was due to take effect on Friday. One part of the law would have limited marijuana providers to distributing to a maximum of three patients and barred them from receiving anything of value for their product.
Montana hasn't banned any other industries from receiving compensation for their goods and services, and the state has declared medical marijuana a legal product, Reynolds said in his ruling. A profit ban would limit the number of willing marijuana providers and deny patients "this fundamental right of seeking their health care in a lawful manner."
"The court is unaware of and has not been shown where any person in any other licensed and lawful industry in Montana — be he a barber, an accountant, a lawyer, or a doctor — who, providing a legal product or service, is denied the right to charge for that service or is limited in the number of people he or she can serve," Reynolds wrote.
Reynolds also blocked provisions of the law banning advertising of medical marijuana, allowing unannounced searches of providers and requiring an investigation into any doctor who recommends marijuana for more than 25 patients in a year.
So, THE JUDGE'S PRELIMINARY RULING on this specific issue - commerce - meant that dispensaries, etc. were operating under Montana law until the full case could be heard.
http://www.flatheadbeacon.com/articles/article/judge_blocks_parts_of_montana_medical_marijuana_law/23716/Oh, the Judge that passed the preliminary ruling noted that
one BIG problem was the unannounced searches of registered premises were a possible violation of the protection against searches and seizures.The Judge noted this is a CONSTITUTIONAL question. So, it would seem the Federal raid isn't just in violation of state law, it's unconstitutional in that it is unreasonable for the feds to raid medical marijuana facilities because the beliefs behind the law are themselves unreasonable - unscientific, unaccepting of reality and research and 5000 years of anecdotal reports that invalidate the raid action's reason for being - to protect society from a substance that has no medicinal value. Tony Scalia himself emphasized the reasonableness of searches. how can a search be legal when it is based upon a law with no foundation in reality? We no longer allow people to raid the homes of suspected witches and burn them at the stake, either.
The Federal raid is also in violation of STATE LAW that has determined that medical marijuana is a legal product that may be grown and sold in the state of Montana. The Obama administration is going beyond the raids in California to go against
legal practices in a state that a judge has also upheld in a preliminary ruling after a legislative attempt at an end run around a law that was voted into place 7 years ago. Without consent of the voters.
A judge has overruled the DEA, basically, whether they like it or not, and told them they may not discriminate against the medical marijuana industry by targeting those who are making money from something that is legal in the state of Montana. The judge also stayed the state legislature in its attempt to override the will of the people.
In response to Essman's action, more than 35 thousand people signed a petition to bring this issue back to a vote by the people of the state, rather than allow legislative fiat to change the law. The petition puts a referendum on the ballot to let the people of Montana vote to indicate whether they agreed or disagreed with Essman's bill when they
vote in 2012.The petition wants to address possible reforms in the law while still making it possible for patients to obtain medicine. But most of all, it wants the people of the state to get to decide whether or not they agree with Essman's move.
http://www.patientsforreform.org/2011/11/01/more-than-35000-montana-voters-signed-the-petition-to-force-vote-on-medical-marijuana-law-changes/The reason some people are trying to go after the Montana law is because 30k people have mmj cards. That's a little over 5% of the voting population of the state and legislators do not think that many people should be allowed to have safe access to cannabis products for medicinal use. I don't know if there's some percentage calculator that states people may or may not be allowed to use a substance in a medicinal manner...do we maintain such figures for aspirin? Does the legislature look at the number of people who are potentially diabetic and attempt to legislate insulin? I just wonder how common it is to have people with no medical background deciding who should be allowed to take a legal medicine.
Anyway, Arizona's citizens also had to tell their legislature to back the fuck off.
It's one thing to regulate. It's quite another to repeal a law and legislators have to have their power checked at the ballot box.
It's a business competition. Who wants to help support the prison-industrial industry that makes the United States the nation with the most citizens in jail - and an overwhelming number of them are in jail because of this very issue of prohibition - or who wants to have an economy that allows adults to make decisions for themselves about whether or not to use a non-toxic, non-lethal substance as a medicine.
I don't know about you, but I prefer to live in a town with dispensaries rather than prison complexes. The view is so much nicer when you're not putting others behind bars in order to fuel an economy by punishing their use of something that is less harmful than most pharmaceutical products in the market, as well as alcohol, the pols' drug of choice.
Obviously the federal govt is interested in putting money into a mindset that wants to discipline and punish rather than uphold some very basic and essential liberties that are granted to adults.
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