Federal

Is the DEA wrong about marijuana’s medical value?

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The Ques­tion Pre­sent­ed I’ve been asked to explain the U.S. Drug Enforce­ment Admin­is­tra­tion (DEA) deci­sion on July 19, 2016, not to accept the Mar­i­jua­na Resched­ul­ing Peti­tion filed by the states of Wash­ing­ton and Rhode Island on Novem­ber 30, 2011.  See Page 53688 of the Fed­er­al Reg­is­ter, Vol. 81, No. 156, Fri­day, August 12, 2016. My … Is the DEA wrong about marijuana’s med­ical val­ue?

Attention on medical marijuana shifts to Congress

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Atten­tion has shift­ed from state leg­is­la­tion to Con­gress and can­di­dates run­ning for fed­er­al office. While rumors have been spread­ing around that the DEA is going to resched­ule mar­i­jua­na in July of 2016, on July 6, Con­gress­man David Young became the first fed­er­al elect­ed offi­cial from Iowa to co-spon­­sor H.R. 1538: the CARERS Act of 2015. … Atten­tion on med­ical mar­i­jua­na shifts to Con­gress

The Marijuana Scheduling Story

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Jon Gettman wrote an arti­cle in High Times Mag­a­zine by the title Pot Mat­ters: The Resched­ul­ing Trap, on Mon­day, Feb­ru­ary 29, 2016, detail­ing his attempts to have mar­i­jua­na fed­er­al­ly resched­uled. I was a peti­tion­er in Mr. Gettman’s most recent attempt to have mar­i­jua­na resched­uled, and I will share my per­spec­tive. The trap Mr. Gettman refers … The Mar­i­jua­na Sched­ul­ing Sto­ry

Marijuana and Federalism Conference

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Pre­sen­ta­tions from our con­fer­ence: “Fed­er­al­ism: The Miss­ing Piece of the Puz­zle!” Sat­ur­day, Octo­ber 31, 2015, 1 PM to 4 PM Com­mu­ni­ty Room, Mick­le Cen­ter, 1620 Pleas­ant St., Des Moines, IA 50314 Dr. Frank Caligiuri, Pro­fes­sor of Phar­ma­cy, “The Sched­ul­ing Dilem­ma” Boris Shcha­ran­sky, Iowa Hemp Asso­ci­a­tion, “Fed­er­al Cannabis Leg­is­la­tion” Carl Olsen, Iowans for Med­ical Mar­i­jua­na, “Fed­er­al­ism” … Mar­i­jua­na and Fed­er­al­ism Con­fer­ence

My Meeting with Congressman Young

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Meet­ing with Con­gress­man Young — 9/22/2015 I met with Con­gress­man David Young (R. IA‑3) on Tues­day, Sep­tem­ber 22, 2015, at 11:00 a.m. I gave him a series of doc­u­ments and had a short dis­cus­sion on each one. I asked him a few ques­tions. One of the things that impressed me right away is that he … My Meet­ing with Con­gress­man Young

Federalism: the missing piece in state medical marijuana laws

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At first glance, state med­ical mar­i­jua­na laws seem to con­flict with fed­er­al law. But that seems odd, because the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment has nev­er attempt­ed to block state med­ical mar­i­jua­na leg­is­la­tion. Why is that? When Con­gress wrote the fed­er­al Con­trolled Sub­stances Act, it placed mar­i­jua­na in some­thing called a sched­ule. A sched­ule is just anoth­er name … Fed­er­al­ism: the miss­ing piece in state med­ical mar­i­jua­na laws

Martin O’Malley will declassify marijuana as a schedule 1 drug

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On July 31, 2015, Mar­tin O’Mal­ley released his white paper on Crim­i­nal Jus­tice Reform, which says, “As pres­i­dent, Gov­er­nor O’Malley will: … Declas­si­fy Mar­i­jua­na as a Sched­ule I Drug.” But, the sen­tence imme­di­ate­ly fol­low­ing that one is less clear, “O’Malley will direct the Attor­ney Gen­er­al to move to reclas­si­fy mar­i­jua­na, while sup­port­ing bipar­ti­san con­gres­sion­al efforts … Mar­tin O’Malley will declas­si­fy mar­i­jua­na as a sched­ule 1 drug

My Amendment to SF 484

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On April 7, 2015, I met with Iowa sen­a­tors Jack Whitver and Charles Schnei­der to dis­cus pro­tect­ing Iowa cannabis patients from the unlaw­ful clas­si­fi­ca­tion of cannabis under the fed­er­al Con­trolled Sub­stances Act. Sen­a­tor Whitver gave me the fol­low­ing amend­ment he had cre­at­ed for me by the Leg­isla­tive Ser­vices Agency: !– clear floats –> Sen­ate File … My Amend­ment to SF 484