House representatives narrowly approved legislation Monday that would permit qualified patients to smoke marijuana medicinally in accordance with state law. The Senate passed a similar though not identical version of the bill last week. Both houses must now agree on a final version of the bill to send to Governor Gary Johnson (R) for approval.
The House’s passage of the bill readies New Mexico to become only the second state government (Hawaii passed a similar law last year.) to approve legislation exempting medical marijuana patients from criminal penalties under state laws. Eight additional states have passed similar laws via voter initiatives.
“What kind of message are we sending? The right message,” said Rep. Dan Foley (R-Roswell), one of ten Republicans who backed the bill. “The message that we care about people and that we’re not going to turn our back on them because of some scare tactic [by people who say] someone suffering from cancer is going to become a drug pusher because of this.”
According to results of a recent state-wide poll commissioned by the Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation, nearly four in five New Mexicans favor allowing seriously ill patients to use medicinal marijuana legally. Sixty-five percent of poll respondents also said that they favored reducing penalties for the possession of small amounts of marijuana from a criminal misdemeanor to a civil offense.
Two additional bills seeking to decriminalize marijuana for recreational purposes remain in committee, but have yet to be voted on by the House or Senate.
New Mexico’s legislative session ends on March 17.
For more information, please contact R. Keith Stroup, NORML Executive Director, at (202) 483-5500. For more information on these bills, visit: http://capwiz.com/norml2/officials/state/?state=NM&lvl=L.
