The battle to provide medical cannabis to the sick, disabled, and dying has been raging for at least a decade. During this time, voters in eight States have passed legislation of one type or another allowing limited access to medical cannabis.

California has led the effort since the early 1990’s. Twice, medical cannabis legislation failed to become law prior to the passage of the historic Proposition 215, the Compassionate Use Act, known as Health and Safety Code 11362.5.

Despite some real victories, the Federal Government remains adamant about crushing the medical cannabis movement. The Feds were encouraged by the unanimous ruling of the Supreme Court in the Oakland OCB case. While the Supreme Court decision only related to using medical necessity as a defense for third party distribution, local authorities widely believe that the Court effectively banned medical cannabis.

Some local police and sheriffs do not need the Supreme Court to carry out their own war on medical cannabis. Throughout California, medical cannabis patients and caregivers continue to be arrested and harassed. Local law enforcement can and does call in the DEA when they wish to circumvent State Law. They may assist the DEA in arrest and seizure or simply turn over patient medicine to the DEA as "contraband".

The California "model" of using a vague voter initiative has not been repeated anywhere else in the nation. For the initiative to work effectively, the State of California was empowered to provide enabling legislation. This has not been done for three reasons:

1. Governor Gray Davis has threatened to veto any medical cannabis legislation but that may change with enough letters.
2. Groups such as the California Narcotics Officers Association have strongly lobbied against legislative action.
3. Some activists within the medical cannabis community feel the State legislation action will compromise rights granted by Prop 215.

The California Supreme Court has yet to rule on whether or not Prop 215 grants new rights or simply provides for a medical necessity defense in State Court. Even if new rights are upheld by the California Court, law enforcement officers still cannot easily verify legitimacy as they can with SB 187.

The reality of medical cannabis in California is that there exists a "crazy quilt" of local perceptions and policies that insures confusion. There is inconsistency in enforcement policy between different counties and even within the same county depending upon the officers involved. Even "safe" counties like Marin or Sonoma had to struggle to develop protective guidelines while counties like Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernadino, eastern Sierra counties, and counties up and down the San Joaquin valley remain hazardous in the extreme.

In all of this confusion, some extremists are trying to set the agenda. On the one side are law enforcement personnel who refuse to recognize Health and Safety Code 11362.5 despite being bound to honor State law by the State Constitution. On the other side are some medical cannabis "activists" who insist upon the ridiculous proposition that any patient with a physician’s recommendation can grow, distribute, and store any amount of cannabis anywhere they wish. One set of extremists is ignoring the law while the other is ignoring cannabis is really medicine.

In the middle are folks like State Senator John Vasconcellos, a strong supporter of medical cannabis, who is trying to push enabling legislation through. He is joined by the State Attorney General and many leading medical cannabis experts and support groups such as California NORML, Marijuana Anti-Prohibition Project, American Alliance for Medical Cannabis, and others including many city and county governments. These folks are getting it from both sides which means they are probably on the right track. They have crafted, amended, and refined Senate Bill 187. The Bill has serious but not fatal flaws including no provision for inter-county Caregiving and no mandate for local officer training. Participation in the program is voluntary and anonymous. Those patients and caregivers who chose to not participate can continue to deal with law enforcement as they do now.

Those vitally interested in seeing medical cannabis work in California should be interested in statewide conformity and the State serving as a bulwark against Federal intrusion. This requires enabling legislation. Without enabling legislation local authorities will have to be challenged one by one with the Feds being brought in to support recalcitrant and suppressive policies. Many patients and caregivers will be hurt in the process. Some areas will remain medical cannabis safe havens while most will continue to resemble the Wild West.

The greatest tragedy will be if the objections of a few medical cannabis activist’s to a reasonable and rational enabling Bill are allowed to kill it by not generating the pressure on Governor Davis that is required for passage. Activists who marginalize themselves in this fashion will see the movement set back years as their inflexibility will be seen as proof that they were only after legalization of all cannabis all along. Enabling legislation is required for two simple reasons:

1. Proposition 215 calls for it
2. Cannabis is the only medicine allowed in California that is not part of the normal checks and balances of the normal drug distribution system

The arguments that cannabis is only an herb and so safe that no controls are required, is foolish. Cannabis is both effective and powerful like other medicines and rightly deserves some sort of control. Enabling legislation will allow the State to enlist the services of the University of California in characterizing and standardizing medicine. SB 187 will lead to caregiver cooperative gardens throughout the State that will be immune from local prosecution. The Vasconcellos Bill will eliminate the current practice of letting the courts "sort things out" when local law enforcement comes upon a garden or a patient’s medicine.

What is to be the future? Will it be local cooperatives growing and sharing medicine without fear or fanfare? Or will it be a gravestone marked, "medical cannabis, died for the principle of it all"?

Write the Governor today at: