Attorney General Eric Holder has announced that the Department of Justice does not consider it a priority to prosecute patients and distributors who are in "clear and unambiguous" compliance with state laws that allow for medical marijuana use.
"This action ... reflects the clear sea change taking place, both domestically and especially internationally, regarding drug policy," writes Glenn Greenwald at Salon. "When Mexico decriminalized drugs for 'personal use' in August, the silence -- including from Washington -- was deafening[.]"
Domestically, one may also note the recent introduction of legislation in the Senate which would end the sentencing disparity for possession of crack and powder cocaine. The minimum sentences for the same amount of the two drugs currently bears a 100:1 ratio which disproportionately affects African Americans. Companion legislation has already been introduced in the House and the Obama administration has voiced support for eliminating the disparity.
ACS has published articles and blog posts related to debate over drug policy, including an Issue Brief by Professor Alex Kreit called Toward a Public Health Approach to Drug Policy, and guest blog posts by San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris and When Brute Force Fails author Professor Mark Kleiman.
Has the Executive Branch overstepped its authority?
Has the Executive Branch overstepped its Constitutional authority by declining to enforce certain criminal laws as a matter of published policy?
Specifically, the Attorney General recently announced that he no longer intended to investigate and/or prosecute the possession, use, cultivation, distribution or sale of marijuana in certain states under certain circumstances. He claims that he is vested with the statutory authority to distribute resources within his organization as he sees fit and that his new marijuana drug policy is a result of insufficient resources. Only part of this is true.
The Department of Justice routinely declines to prosecute certain classes of minor criminal offenses. For example, few U.S. Attorneys are resourced well enough to prosecute minor larcenies. They do not, however, promulgate public policy to that effect. It would be preposterous for them to declare, "From this day forward, the U.S. government will decline to investigate and/or prosecute larcenies of $5,000 or less - because the resources previously dedicated to doing so are better allocated elsewhere."
Imagine if the Legislative Branch enacted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Executive Branch (the folks responsible for the enforcement of that and every federal criminal law) chose not to enforce it as a matter policy? If your response to this is, “Well, that would never happen,” are we to include that they are only responsible for the enforcement of “important laws?”
If the majority of Americans support a total or partial repeal of the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, shouldn’t this be addressed by the Legislators they’ve elected? If this isn’t the case, then the Congress should earmark funds specifically for marijuana enforcement by the Department of Justice in their next appropriations bill.
In any event, the Legislative Branch should hold the Attorney General accountable for his actions; a proper accounting is owed to the American people.
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