Colorado sheriffs have filed a lawsuit in an attempt to overturn legal cannabis in their state. The suit, filed in Denver federal district court against Gov. John Hickenlooper, argues that the officials are sworn to uphold both state and federal law, and the contradiction on marijuana between state and federal laws makes this impossible. While these claims, laid out in a document signed by a collection of Colorado county sheriffs, plus a few from neighboring Nebraska and Kansas, are factually accurate, the signatories would do well to look at the benefits his state has reaped as a result of the revolutionary policy.
Colorado and Washington legalized marijuana for recreational use in 2012, with Colorado the first to authorize actual sales. Since then, Alaska, Oregon and Washington D.C. have legalized as well, with a handful of states looking to join them in 2016. As the state with the most time since its laws were enacted, Colorado is the most closely studied legalization guinea pig. So far, the results have been almost entirely neutral or positive. The state took in an estimated $31 million in tax revenues from cannabis sales in 2014. Property values are up and violent crime has dipped. None of this has stopped the cadre of sheriffs who believe their time was better spent busting nonviolent people for using and selling the herb.
“This suit is about one thing: the rule of law,” writes Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith in a released statement. “The Colorado Constitution mandates that all elected officials, including sheriffs, swear an oath of office to uphold both the United States as well as the Colorado Constitutions.”
Maj. Neill Franklin (Ret.), former Maryland State police captain and executive director of the advocacy group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, argues against the spirit of the lawsuit.
“Legalizing marijuana has allowed police to focus on real crimes but taken away their excuse for otherwise unjustified searches and seizures,” Franklin said in a statement. “I would ask those officers to think about why they joined the force in the first place, why they risk their lives every day just to do their jobs. I doubt many would say it’s to go after low-level drug offenders.… They would say they went into this job because they wanted to protect people, to be heroes, and it’s about time they recognize that that’s the opposite of what they’re doing when they defend current drug policy.”
The contradiction between state and federal law has long been a fact of life in the United States — not just in states with recreational cannabis, but in more than half the states in the U.S. Medical marijuana is illegal under federal law, but 23 states have comprehensive laws on their books to allow it. Additionally, a slew of mostly conservative states have very restrictive medical marijuana laws that allow for low-THC/high-CBD cannabis for a short list of conditions. Meanwhile, the federal government has become increasingly disengaged from policing pot sales that are legal at the state level. Recently, two congressional bills were introduced which would regulate and tax cannabis at the federal level, ending its prohibition.
While coverage around the lawsuit has focused on the question of whether marijuana legalization could be overturned in the court system, the sheriffs claim would be equally resolved if federal restrictions against cannabis were struck down. The Obama administration does not seem focused on the issue at the moment, but the question lingers over whether Obama will reschedule cannabis (moving it from Schedule I, which is the most highly restricted category of ‘drug’ in the U.S.) before his presidency ends. He has the power to single-handedly do so, as drug scheduling is an executive branch duty. Without this sort of executive action, it’s unlikely that the legal contradiction between federal law and state law will come to an end anytime soon.
Don’t by it. Has more to do w/ these crooks miss being able to unconstitutionality confiscate under bad Federal Drug enforcement. The kind of stuff the majority of the public they are supposed to serve, has voted out and are sick of. These NAZIs were all about stealing,
Who is funding this suit? Where is the money coming from, their constituents who voted FOR legalization? Follow the money all round this. see- washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2014/09/06/stop-and-seize/
These dumb ass cops are worried about federal level laws? I thought they follow only state laws? Since when did they work for the federal government? Last I checked they are state police.
Since state law cut into their revenue stream.
(What follows may be interpreted as fiction so as not to offend anyone.)
Please understand that this is a case which may ultimately end up in the US Supreme Court.
The curious thing is that the county Sheriff’s Department and the state’s court system would have had to collude in an agreement to bring this to loggerheads at the state level. This way the Congress and White House can save face by allowing the Supreme Court to do what they couldn’t, namely, repeal the federal drug laws in favor of states rights. More important than drug policy being shifted to the state’s sole discretion is that this landmark case would be precedent for other states rights disputers with the federal government.
Now here’s the double-edged sword… while applauding state’s rights for marijuana legalization, the federal government might also lose other state’s rights cases to be decided at the state level such as Roe V. Wade… This uses the Democratic Left to enact neoliberal drug policy on behalf of the Republican Right without alienating either parties base (which would be understood to feed any independent parties). If I haven’t lost the reader yet, the benefit to the states is obvious, the benefit to 2-party system is more profound… By “relieving” Congress of the burden of legislating domestic social policy, Congress can focus abroad (i.e. next war). The states burden is now to legislate for social issues and since these are more polarized at the local level, this also reinforces the 2-party system. Federal:Wins, State:Wins, You:Lose!
Why? … Well, corporate interests can more effectively legislate at the state level through cognitive-capture lobbying techniques to subvert national news attention. Controversial non-starters on the national stage now have new legislative life under the corporate, I mean, state’s control.
Corporations:Wins, State:Wins, 2-party:Wins, You:Lose again!
All this because,
States are financially-bankrupt and desperately seeking revenue, Congress is morally-bankrupt and can barely seem legitimate so it needs to divert the heat.
Corporations are creatively-bankrupt because they can’t figure out how to maintain growth for the 1%.
The Supreme Court is ideologically-bankrupt as they once again fall prey to being forced to legislate from the bench.
The Office of President is only bankrupt of political-will in this fight as there are more important expenditures of political-capital to be waged.
Now, since the Federal Reserve is literally-bankrupt because it favored a fiat currency over a precious metal-backed standard of exchange. Seems like everyone else except the 99% won again. Is this table rigged or what? Now how much would it cost to politically-capture the Sheriff’s Department at a state level to bring this improbable series of events into our future? Relative to the power shifted to our corporatocracy, I don’t imagine any price is too much as an investment in the status quo.
PM me for part II: Who’s keeping score? And how close are we to the tipping point? Why is change the only true constant? Orwell or Huxley? … Both! Why has the prison-industrial complex loaded up with debt, window-dressed their stocks, insured their bonds, and will be smiling at the falling prisoner count? Hint: It’s why Warren Buffet looked so miserable the other day… You win some, you lose some… wait, you still lose. ;-(
“If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so.” ~ Thomas Jefferson
thats only because they cant catch real crimanals
these people would do well to understand what the source of the law is. This country is not ruled by kings, its government ruled by the people. And it is the will of the people that makes up the law. The will of the people is higher than the will of the government. The people are the law. The laws are just a recording of that.
That is called tyranny of the masses. Tyranny of any kind is unjust regardless of the motives behind it. Understand that the masses have been brainwashed to believe all drugs are evil and must be controlled by those in power who want to keep the masses under their thumb. Much of the information we have been given of drugs, marijuana in particular, were lies intended to sway public opinion.
There is a profit motive involved here. One, from the pharmaceutical industry who don’t want to compete with naturally occurring drugs they cannot patent or sell at a profit. A prime example is cocaine. It was once used to treat pain as a natural painkiller usually in the form of a tea and not the concentrated powder used today. The Bayer company lobbied to make it illegal to consume cocaine as it competed with Aspirin. Two, later from the law enforcement/prison industry when they saw how profitable it was to keep people incarcerated and confiscate personal property.
every one of these Sherifs should be fired come election day.
I think a few sheriffs are upset that they have to pay for their cannabis now.
They are mad plain a simple about the money they are losing….Maybe if they do not know how to do there jobs its time to replace them with some one who can…They are just mad that they have to work not set on there fat asses at a doughnut shop waiting for a stonier with the munchies to show up to bust ….
The National sheriff’s association should sue the federal government over the contradiction of state and federal law.I myself have a problem with the federal government knowing and patenting the many benefits of cannabis while incarcerating and brainwashing the public with tax dollars.I also think it is a little strange that while we know that they lied while people suffered they seem not to care. Many blame the pharmaceutical companies for the legality of cannabis I blame the government.I also think it is strange that when a state legalizes medicinal cannabis the public seems to get excited about the fact that the government is going to profit even more by taxation and regulation.I think after all the years of dishonesty by the government they have no right to profit from this.
By their own argument – the current DOJ position is to abide by state laws as was announced by the DOJ January 2014 so BACK OFF JACK
Laws that prohibit drug use are a violation of the right to pursue happiness as stated in the Declaration of Independence. The only ones who are made unhappy by such a freedom are the ones that can’t mind their own business. We have a nanny state that is constantly making decisions for us without our consent. As long as someone is using drugs for recreational purposes and is not hurting anyone, there is no reason to make it a crime to want to partake of it. As long as someone is of the age of legal consent, it is no one else’s business but their own what they put into their body.
This is 100% about asset forfeiture and many lost by each county’s Sherriff department. Their entire budget comes form civil forfeiture. Legalizing marijuana is a major bite out of their budget. Sickening really, to want to arrest and imprison people to generate money. Its unbelievable immoral .