Legislation that would allow seriously ill patients to possess and cultivate marijuana for medical purposes was recently argued before legislatures in Missouri and Maine.
Missouri’s measure (H.B. 601) states that, “No criminal or civil penalty shall apply to the patient or the patient’s primary caregiver for the act of possessing or cultivating marijuana” provided that the patient’s use is certified by a physician. According to Missouri NORML President Dan Viets, Esq., the certification by the doctor may be made following an arrest and would provide an affirmative defense of medical necessity for patients against state marijuana charges. The legislation does not limit marijuana’s medical use to specific ailments and allows for “research project[s] related to the medicinal uses of marijuana” to be conducted at state universities. The bill was introduced by Rep. Vickie Riback Wilson (D-Boone County) and is co-sponsored by Public Health Committee Chairwoman Mary Bland (D-Kansas City).
Viets, who serves on NORML’s Board of Directors, and two others testified before the Missouri House Public Health Committee on February 18. “The comments and questions by members of the … committee indicate that there is support … for the bill,” Viets said. “I am very optimistic we can get this bill through the legislature.”
The committee has yet to vote on the measure, but is expected to shortly. The Missouri legislature passed a resolution in 1994 requesting the federal government lift the ban on marijuana for medical purposes (S.C.R. 14).
In Maine, a pair of bills (L.D. 1059 and L.D. 1006) relating to the use of marijuana for medical use, were heard before the Joint Standing Committee on Health and Human Services. One measure, introduced by Sen. Ann Rand (D-Cumberland), would, “Create an affirmative defense [of medical necessity] to a charge of possession or cultivation of marijuana provided a licensed physician has recommended in writing the use of the drug to alleviate negative medical symptoms.” The law would limit the amount of marijuana possessed or cultivated by the patient to 4 ounces of usable marijuana and a total of 15 growing plants, of which no more than 6 may be mature. The bill currently has eight co-sponsors. “If there’s something that can really relieve people of suffering, then it should be used,” Rand told reporters earlier this year. “It should be used properly and judiciously, but it should be used.”
The second bill before the legislature, introduced by Rep. Kathleen Stevens (D-Orono), re-establishes the Marijuana Therapeutic Research Program, which was repealed December 31, 1987. Such programs allow seriously ill patients who are not responding to conventional medications to receive marijuana from their state Board of Health for “research” purposes. Currently, 13 states have laws allowing for the implementation of such programs; however, none are currently active. During the early 1980s, patients in at least six states received medical marijuana through state-run research programs.
Testimony in favor of the bills was heard on March 3, including remarks from NORML Board Member John P. Morgan, M.D., of City University of New York (CUNY) Medical School. Two current medical marijuana users also gave personal accounts to the committee.
No one spoke against the bills, although three state officials — the commissioner of public safety, the director of the state Bureau of Health, and the director of the state Office of Substance Abuse — issued a statement opposing them.
Maine legislators passed a medical marijuana bill in 1991 re-establishing Maine’s marijuana research program and allowing licensed pharmacies to distribute marijuana to certified patients, but then-Gov. John McKernan vetoed it.
Maine’s current governor, Angus King — an Independent — remains “skeptical but open-minded” to the issue, according to a report in the Portland Press Herald.
“Both historically and presently, states have been well ahead of the federal government on the medical marijuana issue,” said NORML’s Deputy Director Allen St. Pierre, who noted that similar bills are pending in at least five other states. “It appears that both of these measures — if passed — will benefit thousands of seriously ill patients.”
For more information, please contact Allen St. Pierre of NORML at (202) 483-5500 or Dan Viets of Missouri NORML at (573) 443-6866. For more information on current state medical marijuana laws or to request a copy of NORML‘s medical marijuana guidebook for state representatives, please contact Paul Armentano of NORML. Contact information for Reps. Wilson, Rand, and Stevens is available from the national office.