Can Measure 3 to legalize marijuana win this November? I went to North Dakota to see for myself.
Tag: North Dakota
The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws endorses North Dakota’s voter-initiated, adult use marijuana legalization effort, Measure 3.
Today, the North Dakota Secretary of State’s office confirmed that LegalizeND has submitted more than enough signatures to qualify a marijuana legalization initiative for the November ballot.
Proponents of a statewide ballot initiative to legalize the adult use of marijuana in North Dakota turned in nearly 19,000 signatures to the Secretary of State’s office today in an effort to place the measure before voters this November. State officials must certify 13,452 signatures in order to qualify the measure for the 2018 electoral ballot.
Legislators in a number of states are pushing forward measures to delay the enactment of several voter-initiated marijuana laws. NORML Executive Director Erik Altieri called the efforts “an affront to the democratic process.” He added: “Voters have lived with the failings of marijuana prohibition for far too long already. Lawmakers have a responsibility to abide by the will of the voters and to do so in a timely manner.”
The “rational basis” here is that North Dakota farmers can’t grow tall, reedy hemp plants that could never ever get anyone high, because that will confuse the law enforcement officials who are working to eradicate short bushy cannabis plants that are grown to get people high. Somehow, in Australia, Canada, and China to name a few countries, police who are tasked with eradicating illegal cannabis in those countries that have legal hemp have no difficulty whatsoever distinguishing the two crops, but American police are just baffled by basic agriculture.
After a decade-long political and legal battle with the federal government, the state of North Dakota and their farmers are still being denied the ability to cultivate–and prosper from- industrial hemp (i.e., cannabis that is under 1% THC in content and therefore is used for industrial purposes), unlike their brethren farmers in France, China, Great Britain, Canada and now…Uruguay.