Many drug law reformers are frightful over who President-elect Donald Trump will appoint to his cabinet to oversee the war on drugs. Might there be a crack down and reversal of marijuana law reform? While a President’s cabinet choices are always a concern, a big picture analysis shows that efforts to legalize and decriminalize drugs are spreading and going global. The war on drugs is shrinking, not expanding.
Under federal law marijuana is currently a DEA Schedule 1 drug just like heroin. Schedule 1 drugs are considered to have no medical value, are subject to abuse and there is no accepted safe use even under medical supervision.
In 1996 California passed Proposition 215, the first medical marijuana law permitting legal use with respect to state and local authorities. This measure essentially meant that the voters in California effectively nullified federal and international law. Since then 27 other states, the District of Columbia, Guam and Puerto Rico have joined California with their own comprehensive public medical marijuana programs.
More Recently 17 states have approved the use of low THC (which get you ‘high’), high cannabidiol (CBD) which does not, for medical reasons, limited situations, or as a legal defense. Some of these new laws are highly restrictive. For example, in Alabama it is restricted to test subjects at one university hospital research facility.
This post was published at Ludwig von Mises Institute on Dec 14, 2016.
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