
U.S. To End Policy That Let Legal Pot Flourish - daegloe
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-04/ap-newsbreak-us-to-end-policy-that-let-legal-pot-flourish
======
danschumann
I think weed should be legal. I also think Sessions should enforce every law,
lest he pick and choose what is illegal and what is not, thus becoming the
most powerful law-maker ( or unmaker ) in the land.

Passing a law is the act of the legislative, and repealing a law is too. If he
does not enforce all the laws, he basically is seizing the power of congress
and repealing those laws, for his term.

Imagine Sessions chose not to enforce every law. He could choose to stop
enforcing tax laws to people from his home state. No. He has to enforce every
law.

It is congress's job to repeal the stupid law, and I hope they do, especially
if this creates more pressure for them.

~~~
brightball
IMO that's the correct answer. The only reason it was flourishing was due to
lack of enforcement of federal law. It needs to be addressed at the federal
level or there needs to be a clear method for states to veto/nullify/ignore
federal laws that they feel overreach.

I can't remember the procedure, but isn't there some method for a state to
nullify a federal law that it disagrees with?

~~~
owenmarshall
There is a method for states to nullify federal laws they disagree with; the
last time we tried it, though, the side effects were a bit undesirable.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Slavery was not against federal law when that happened. It only happened much
later toward the end of the war with the 13th amendement.

~~~
Clubber
As an aside, if you believe the Emancipation Proclamation to be legally
binding, slavery was legal in the North longer than it was in the South.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
That would be equivalent to an executive order, I’m not sure if you could call
it a law, more like a regulation. But maybe things were a bit different back
then.

~~~
Clubber
It was, but the South had seceded, so they considered themselves a separate
country with a separate (albeit hastily constructed) government, so executive
orders don't apply to other countries. The legality of secession wasn't even
decided until after the war, so it was a bunch of murky legal territory.

~~~
brightball
Was it ever decided?

~~~
Clubber
Yes, sort of. After the end of the war, it was ruled unconstitutional (by
SCOTUS), but only applied to 1869 onward. (perhaps meaning it was legal in
1861). The actual ruling is still being debated.

[https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/2056/was-the-
sec...](https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/2056/was-the-secession-of-
the-confederate-states-illegal)

~~~
brightball
That is a very interesting read

------
rufugee
Is there an easy way to track donations from alcohol/big pharma lobbyists to
the Republican party? I'm betting quite a bit of money, rather than concern
for the prole's welfare, is behind this.

Sessions said this in March: "I reject the idea that America will be a better
place if marijuana is sold in every corner store. And I am astonished to hear
people suggest that we can solve our heroin crisis by legalizing marijuana –
so people can trade one life-wrecking dependency for another that’s only
slightly less awful,” he told law enforcement officials in March. Our nation
needs to say clearly once again that using drugs will destroy your life."

As it happens, a person close to me who was a true alcoholic (physically
dependent, would have seizures if they didn't drink, tried AA and failed
through the 12 steps a number of times) successfully stopped drinking by
choosing to safely vape pot instead. They vape about every two days. How
exactly did pot destroy this person's life?

\- edited to add big pharma

~~~
Shivetya
If you follow the donations in this sector its usually boring and more towards
whomever is in power. I would concentrate more on police and sheriff PACs and
those related to the prison systems; not private but public which are most
covered by PACs

while I find some things to like about this Administration as a Libertarian it
stops when confronted with Sessions.

then again all this opens the door to more opportunities to flip this to
Congress and put pressure there. The previous Administration did not push this
either, they did their typical chicken move of pretending it wasn't an issue.
As in, if we don't enforce the law then that means we don't support it. Yet no
effort to repeal

~~~
cmurf
The executive branch can't repeal laws, they can choose to selectively enforce
them. Also, the previous administration via the state department, was working
on unwinding the many agreements we have with other countries on marijuana
legalization, it's hardly tenable to legalize it at a federal level while
we're still giving (let's call it slush) money to governments who make it
illegal, and punishing those who don't.

This administration has castrated the state department, so near as I can tell,
none of that effort is happening anymore. And in fact any government paying
attention would refuse to take such moves seriously now that the AG is
reversing the prior administration's efforts thus far.

------
bediger4000
Why? What harm can the Feds point to, with respect to legal marijuana? It's
been mostly good in Colorado. Sales tax on marijuana has offset some budget
problems citizens of Colorado inflicted on themselves (TABOR). Apparently,
crime in Colorado isn't uniformly rising: most categories of crime are less
common since legalization, a few have risen a bit. This is in line with a
secular drop in crime in all of th USA, however, so, again, mixed bag.

~~~
btbuildem
It harms the pharmaceutical industry, the private prisons and police budgets,
to name a few examples.

~~~
louky
Police unions are also uniformly opposed to legalization, as it will reduce
the need for police by definition if the hundreds of thousands of "crimes" per
year vanish into smoke.

Fewer officers, less money and less power.

Of the 8.2 million marijuana arrests between 2001 and 2010, 88% were for
simply having marijuana (ACLU).

------
goalieca
So much for « states rights »

> Sessions, who has assailed marijuana as comparable to heroin and has blamed
> it for spikes in violence

Pot smokers aren’t violent people because it tends to chill you out. The
growers and dealers can belong to criminal organizations and cause problems.
So naturally, keeping the gangs in business by keeping pot illegal is top
priority.

~~~
saas_co_de
Quite the contrary. I am glad he is doing this. It is a huge tactical blunder
that will force the states' rights issue into court and either result in a
victory for the states or massive public discontent about federal overthrow of
popular state policies.

Either way the federal government is going to see their influence eroded here.

~~~
dragonwriter
> It is a huge tactical blunder that will force the states' rights issue into
> court and either result in a victory for the states or massive public
> discontent about federal overthrow of popular state policies.

The states already lost; this already went to the Supreme Court _before_
Congress restricted such prosecution, and the feds won completely.

What will go to court next—unless Rohrabacher-Farr fails to be renewed (it's
included in the most recent stopgap spending measure, but that expires, IIRC,
later this month) before any prosecutions under the new DoJ policy—will not be
a Constitutional states rights issue, but a federal statutory interpretation
issue over whether DoJ is _prohibited by Congress_ from this action.

~~~
saas_co_de
> The states already lost

precisely. which is why we need the feds to try and enforce the law again in
order to relitigate it.

~~~
carlf79
That's not how this works. The court operates under the rule of stare decsis
which would already make this a tough hill to climb. Even more, the line of
reasoning in the decision agreeing to federal restriction of in-state
marijuana sales goes all the way back to the great depression and is really
unlikely to be overturned in just over a decade since it was decided last
time.

~~~
saas_co_de
> the court operates under the rule of stare decsis

Yes and no. If you have a decision on one set of facts made on one basis just
come up with another set of facts and another basis where you can get a
opposing result without necessary logical conflict and you are all good.

The rat's nest of federal law and prior opinions makes this trivial, so at the
end of the day, all legal opinions are arbitrary, and the only actual basis
for any decision is whether or not it serves the interests of the court, which
outside of the pet peeves, biases, and corruptions of individual judges,
consists mostly of the perpetuation of the institution.

The SC's power is rooted in the federal government, and it is stacked with
statist/corporatist hacks, so it will always have a preference for extending
federal power, but that instinct must be tempered by the threat of an over-
extension which reveals the inherent weakness of their position.

Making a move against a majority of the states now, on a subject where popular
opinion is clearly against them, and with an all time low level of trust and
respect for the federal government would definitely not be desirable.

Normally they could just refuse to hear appeals, but the 9th circuit is in a
pretty feisty mood these days so I wouldn't be too surprised if they sided
with the states, which would then force the SC to either let their ruling
stand, or expose themselves directly on the issue.

Either way, they either let the states keep this going, or they piss off a lot
of people, and either way is bad for them and good for the states.

~~~
dragonwriter
If Rohrabacher-Farr doesn't expire, the states will challenge the action as a
violation of _federal statute_ (where they've _won_ before against the Feds
trying to narrowly interpret Rohrabacher-Farr) rather than launching a
Constitutional challenge of on grounds where there is crystal clear Supreme
Court precedent against them, and little reason to believe the Court has moved
in their favor.

Even if they _also_ raise the Constitutional argument, a Court that fears
public opinion as much as you suggest would likely take the less precedent-
disturbing approach to the popular result by resting a decision on
Rohrabacher-Farr (even if that took a somewhat expansive interpretation of
that prohibition on DoJ use of funds) rather than overturning Gonzalez v.
Raich.

------
shams93
If you look at the fine print he's still leaving the decision to crack down to
each stares attorney general but sessions is doing exactly what you would want
to do is you want to see the opiate crisis get much worse. These people in DC
are so stupid they don't even have the brain power of an earthworm but they
want to treat us lower than dogs like we were born to be Jeff Sessions slaves.
I'm so sick of these bullies.

~~~
DanBC
Cannabis use isn't the solution to opioid deaths.

Other countries have strict laws about cannabis, and those laws are enforced,
and they don't have the problems of opioid deaths that the US has.

The real solution to opioid death is adequate treatment for pain; and treating
addiction as a health problem not a criminal justice problem.

~~~
hfourm
"The real solution to opioid death is adequate treatment for pain"

Like.... medical marijuana?

Hard to believe you wrote those three sentences without putting two and two
together.

Regardless if I partially agree with you, further criminalizing marijuana is
also NOT the solution to opioid deaths.

~~~
DanBC
There's not much evidence of efficacy for cannabis as a treatment for long
term pain.

~~~
hfourm
To replace all instances of opioids? No.

It does a very good job with neuropathic pain though.

------
tenpies
Keep in mind this is based on two anonymous sources. The track record for
those has been less than stellar since Trump began his administration.

~~~
Bahamut
Sometimes the leaks are intentional to gauge public reaction, and then actual
action is taken based in part on feedback.

~~~
e40
Leaks of this sort are almost always trial balloons. I'm sure this was an
intentional leak. They're looking for a backlash, at which point they can
quietly forget about it (if they don't want the fight) and pretend it never
happened.

------
40acres
I doubt that prosecutors in liberal states with legal markets (Oregon,
Washington, California, Nevada) will clamp down on the industry, in fact under
certain conditions I could see them clarifying their stance and perhaps
clearing confusion as to how federal law will be enforced.

However, I do think that this may halt the spread of the industry into midwest
and north east markets.

~~~
olfactory
I think it may already be too established in the midwest for anything like
this to threaten the spread of the legal pot industry.

I suspect this is a tactic to justify Federally taxing marijuana, and would be
consistent with Trump's broader approach of making tax policy tweaks that hit
the bluest states and regions the hardest.

~~~
beamatronic
Never forget: Trump did not even want to be president, as revealed yesterday.
So this is the alt-rights way of exacting revenge for 8 years of Obama, by
punishing the 52% of voters who didn't vote for Trump. The right is getting
their licks in while they can.

Edited for clarity

------
Havoc
This guy is messing with my gains. Can't he go rant about tax deductions and
too much regulation like a normal republican?

~~~
swarnie_
Budz off 37% already today.

Hope sessions and his boyfriend had short positions on this dumpster fire

~~~
dang
Please don't post like this here.

------
runesoerensen
The Justice Dept has now issued a memorandum
[https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-issues-
mem...](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-issues-memo-
marijuana-enforcement)

------
madengr
It’d be nice if pro drug and pro gun laws were both exempt from federal pre-
emption. In Kansas, state law says guns made in the state are exempt from
federal regulation. Of course the federal government disagrees. Pot and gun
enthusiasts should band together.

------
nsfmc
This reads like a strong warning to the already cautious payment processors
that legalization hasn’t eased any of the uncertainty around processing
payments for dispensaries or made banking any simpler for them despite a
massive market having just opened.

------
bradleyjg
If I were a US Attorney trying to bring pot cases in California, Colorado, or
Washington I'd be very worried about jury nullification. Maybe I'd be able to
solve the problem in voir dire but I wouldn't bet on it.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Most people don't know what jury nullification is, and the courts specifically
do not instruct juries on it. Hence, it is not a big concern really.

~~~
bradleyjg
People don't need to know what jury nullification or be instructed on it in
order to engage in it. It was happening in England before this country even
existed. Ask any prosecutor and she'll tell you about a case where it happened
to her.

------
mancerayder
Maybe this is a good thing: policies like this are going to damage the
Republicans in the midterms.

There's only so much war waged on progressive policies before more and more
even right-wing types feel their toes being stepped on.

------
mnm1
The states that have legalized it should do everything in their power to not
provide any assistance to the federal government in this or any other
investigations till the policy is improved, just like sanctuary cities are
doing. The states have a lot of legal options on how to handle this. We'll see
if they do the right thing or if they bend over backwards for a piece of shit
racist AG who has already allegedly (my ass) perjured himself.

------
protomyth
[https://www.popehat.com/2018/01/04/lawsplainer-attorney-
gene...](https://www.popehat.com/2018/01/04/lawsplainer-attorney-general-
sessions-threatened-action-on-marijuana/)

Popehat's response is, as always, fun to read and more informative and less
fear mongering than most sources of information.

------
sedtrader
> as polls show a solid majority of Americans believe the drug should be legal

I am for the legalizing of marijuana, but considering the majority of
Americans live in only 9 of the states, decisions should not be made based on
the "majority". Federal law based on what the majority wanted was one of the
things that the framers were afraid of. 9 states should not be able to dictate
what occurs in the other 41 states and vice versa. Full state rights. Again I
am for the legalization marijuana, but this needs to be a state by state
decision, not federal govt.

~~~
dbingham
To flip this, the minority of the country that live in 39 states should not be
able to dictate the law to the majority of the country who just happen to be
concentrated in a relatively small area. That's tyranny of the minority, which
is arguably far worse than the tyranny of the majority the framers feared.

~~~
mieseratte
On the other hand one could frame this as the majority of states decided and
those nine states are the tyrannical minority.

~~~
SauciestGNU
Empty land doesn't have a right to suffrage, _people_ do.

~~~
mieseratte
We're not talking about "empty land," we're talking about member states of a
federation. Those members get to decide, you merely tell your state, vaguely,
what you want.

------
conductr
This is poised to be a giant states rights issue/fight and there's nothing
Trump likes more than a fight

------
dragonwriter
“Legal” is incorrect in the headline, as there is no “legal pot” in the United
States (well, aside from very narrow research, etc., allowed by the feds,
which is not the focus of this policy.)

The fact that states don't have espionage laws covering everything in the
federal espionage act doesn't mean that those states have “legal espionage”.

~~~
an_account
You’re conflating two different things. In the former, states have set up
legal framework for marijuana sales. In the later, state laws don’t have any
opinion on the matter.

~~~
dragonwriter
If a state like California sets up an imprisonment scheme under it's laws that
violates federal law (to choose an example that has happened recently), it's
still illegal prison overcrowding, not legal prison overcrowding.

A system under state law in violation of valid federal law is, because of the
supremacy clause, an _illegal_ system.

------
kylejamzz
Sessions has clearly never had a session.

~~~
knieveltech
Given the frequency with which old guard Republican politicians get caught
soliciting liaisons in public mens rooms while openly supporting legislation
that discriminates against the LGBTQ+ community I'd drug test Sessions before
I made any assumptions about his use habits.

------
shams93
If you're trying to destroy the country on behalf of Putin forcing millions of
middle aged chronic pain patients off cannabis onto opiates and inevitably
heroin and fentynal is an efficient way to murder millions of people without
firing a single shot.

~~~
dang
Please don't post inflammatory rants here. Any point worth making can be made
civilly and substantively.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

