Current Sup. Court argument against med. marijuana is based on 1942 ruling

On the subject of marijuana, I am a civil libertarian. In my opinion, it should be legal to grow, sell, buy, and smoke medical and recreational marijuana. Recreational marijuana should be banned for people under 18. Medical marijuana should be allowed for minors only with a doctor's approval, but automatic approval should be required for minors with cancer, AIDS, etc.

Persoanlly, I have never smoked it. But I cannot for the life of me comprehend why anyone should be put in jail for doing so.

The current Supreme Court case against medical marijuana is using the exact same argument that occurred in a 1942 case regarding wheat.

In the 1942 case, a farmer was growing wheat for his own consumption, but the court ruled that this could be outlawed under the commerce clause, because by growing his own wheat, he wasn't buying wheat from other farmers, so that affected interstate commerce.

So the current case against medical marijuana is quoting the 1942 case, arguing that if a person grows his own medical marijuana, then he isn't buying drugs from the big pharmaceutical companies, so that affects interstate commerce.

Personally, I think the 1942 ruling is bogus, and so is the current argument. However, I am no legal scholar. I do know that the Founding Fahters grew their own wheat and their own hemp, though, and I'm sure they would be outraged at the 1942 ruling on wheat as well as the current effort to ban medical marijuana.

Here are some excerpts from two columns from some civil libertarians explaining how the current Supreme Court argument against medical marijuana is using the 1942 wheat ruling as justification. If you wish to read the articles in full you can click on the links. I see other people here post articles with "snip snip" for the fair use clause, instead of posting the whole article. So OK, here goes!

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig4/watkins4.html

Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of Ashcroft v. Raich (No. 03-1454). The issues in Raich touch on the fundamental concerns of federalism and individual liberty. The Court must decide whether the Constitution’s Commerce Clause permits Congress, via the federal Controlled Substances Act, to prohibit the medicinal use of cannabis.

The case will also affect the quality of life and longevity of two seriously ill California women. Angel Raich suffers from paralysis, an inoperable brain tumor, seizures, chronic pain, life-threatening weight loss, and many other ailments. Diane Monson is afflicted with chronic back pain and muscle spasms caused by a degenerative disease of the spine. Their physicians concluded that the ladies’ pain could not be relieved with ordinary medication. Pursuant to California’s Compassionate Use Act, the physicians prescribed marijuana. Under the Compassionate Use Act, a patient or his primary caregiver may possess or cultivate cannabis solely for personal medical purposes of the patient as recommended by a physician.

Both women have experienced beneficial results from the cannabis. Raich, for example, was once confined to a wheelchair and is now able to ambulate. Without the use of cannabis, her condition will most certainly retrograde.

<snip snip>

In 1942, the Court considered the constitutionality of FDR’s Agricultural Adjustment Act. In Wickard v. Filburn, the Court was presented with the question of whether Congress could regulate a farmer’s growing of wheat intended solely for consumption on his farm. A local activity, lectured the Court, can "be reached by Congress if it exerts a substantial economic effect on interstate commerce." Although the 11.9 acres of wheat in question did not seem to affect interstate commerce, the Court reasoned that the farmer’s wheat, "taken together with that of many others similarly situated, is far from trivial." Because the growing of wheat for home consumption by hundreds or thousands of farmers could affect the demand and price of wheat, the acts of a solitary bucolic soul fall under Congress’ power to regulate commerce.

Not surprisingly, the government’s brief in Raich relies heavily on Wickard. According to the Solicitor General, "ome-grown marijuana displaces drugs sold in both the open drug market and the black drug market regulated by ." From this the government concludes that "Congress has the power to regulate the interstate market in marijuana as well as activity that substantially affects that market, regardless of the purported use of the drug." Under the government’s reasoning, Congress could regulate procreation because a rise in the population could affect the interstate market and price of cannabis. If the government’s argument prevails, then Congress will have an unrestrained police power to regulate all facets of American life. The remainder of Congress’ enumerated powers in Article I, Section Eight of the Constitution will be rendered superfluous.

<snip snip>

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http://www.jewishworldreview.com/jeff/jacoby121004.asp

Ashcroft v. Raich, the Supreme Court's medical marijuana case, isn't really about medical marijuana. It's about power — the power of Congress to exert control, and the power of the Constitution to rein Congress in.

The named plaintiff in this case is Angel McClary Raich, a California mother of two afflicted with an awful array of diseases, including tumors in her brain and uterus, asthma, severe weight loss, and endometriosis. To ease her symptoms, doctors put her on dozens of standard medications. When none of them helped, they prescribed marijuana. That did help — so much so that Raich, who had been confined to a wheelchair, was again able to walk.

<snip snip>

The Supreme Court's most expansive reading of the Commerce Clause came in Wickard v. Filburn, a unanimous 1942 decision about a farmer who grew more wheat on his farm than was allowed under federal law. Roscoe Filburn argued that his excess wheat was none of Washington's business, since it all remained on his farm — some of it he ground into flour, for his family, some he fed to his livestock, and some he planted the following year. None of it entered interstate commerce, so what right did Congress have to penalize it?

But a unanimous Supreme Court ruled against Filburn. It held that his 239 excess bushels of wheat affected the national wheat market whether he sold it or not, since wheat he produced for his own use was wheat he didn't have to buy elsewhere. If other farmers did the same thing, demand for wheat — and its price — would fall. That ruling threw the door open to virtually unbridled congressional activism. After all, if wheat that never left the farm it grew on was tied to "interstate commerce" and therefore subject to federal control, what wasn't? Not surprisingly, the years since Wickard have seen a vast expansion of federal authority.

<snip snip snip>

"It looks like Wickard to me," Justice Antonin Scalia said. "I always used to laugh at Wickard, but that's what Wickard says."

Well, if Wickard says that Congress can ban or penalize Angel Raich's marijuana — noncommercial, medically necessary, locally grown, and legal under state law — then it says Congress can reach absolutely any activity at all. When I was a law student in the 1980s, I didn't laugh at Wickard, I was appalled by it. If Ashcroft v. Raich is decided for the government, future law students will have an even more appalling case to study.