5 ms·

I wonder how many state has to legalize it before the federal government in USA is forced to change their classification. It seems like more and more state will

I wonder how many state has to legalize it before the federal government in USA is forced to change their classification. It seems like more and more state will legalize it over time anyways.

KempFood 8y ago
Maybe in another 40 years. People aren’t smart, they are as dumb as nails. Sad!
- fein 8y ago
  The people aren't really the ones making the decision. Here in Ohio, for example, we didn't have a vote on recreational, instead we had a vote on a government sanctioned monopoly possibly leading the way to recreational. If there was some sort of state issue that could be voted on which was "regulate it like we do garden tomatoes", it would pass. Leadership has prevented this, not your cartoon idea of the oh so ignorant voter base. Too often we blame the salt of the earth people for things the media has done. Rule by multi millionaire propagandists.
  - thaumasiotes 8y ago
    According to wikipedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initiatives_and_referendums_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initiatives_and_referendums_in... ) and ballotpedia ( https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Indirect_initiative_statute https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Indirect_initiative_s... ), Ohio allows indirect initiatives. Meaning that if you were right about the voting base, it would be easy to legalize recreational marijuana without worrying what the leadership thought. > In the indirect form, initiative sponsors collect signatures and once the signatures are collected, the measure is taken up by the state legislature in their state. The legislature has these options: > Enact the measure as written in the petition. > Refuse to act on the measure, in which case it goes on the ballot. https://ballotpedia.org/Initiated_state_statute https://ballotpedia.org/Initiated_state_statute The leadership is not capable of preventing legalization if the salt of the earth is in favor of it.
    - fein 8y ago
      The salt of the earth doesn't give a shit about the local government; they just want to be left alone for the most part. The issue is getting the signatures in the first place, which requires canvassing, which requires paying someone to organize all of that. The last example of a successful canvassing that we had was a grab at a monopoly over growing ops, which was funded partly by a former member of the boy band NSYNC. The other hurdle is approval by the legislature. In Ohio it's not as simple as "get signatures, get on the ballot".
      - thaumasiotes 8y ago
        > The other hurdle is approval by the legislature. In Ohio it's not as simple as "get signatures, get on the ballot". I'm open to more specialized information, but the description on ballotpedia strongly implies that it is that simple. Specifically, it says that the steps are: 1. Get signatures. 2. The legislature must consider the initiative, either approving or rejecting it. 3a. If the legislature approves the initiative, it becomes law without having to go on the ballot. 3b. If the legislature rejects the initiative, it goes on the ballot. Thus, once you have signatures, the worst case is that you go straight onto the ballot, and the best case is that you become law without needing to. Theoretically, it could be possible for the legislature to sit on the initiative without ever approving or rejecting it. All I'm working off here is a cursory description of the law of several states including Ohio. Do you have relevant knowledge of Ohio law?
  - charlex815 8y ago
    Politicians are more often mirrors of society than agents of change. Demand change from them, they aren't reading Hacker News. If they refuse change, campaign against them.
    - anoncoward111 8y ago
      >campaign against them And then suddenly when the death threats and FBI audits and etc start showing up in your life, and you lose the campaign anyway, you'll say to yourself, "shit, this isn't a democracy we're living in, this is just a mafia state."
      - koverda 8y ago
        Tinfoil hats are this way.
        anoncoward111 8y ago
        Go run for office then. Surely it can't be that hard and daunting.
        api 8y ago
        Meh. Faraday mesh hats work much better.
  - gm-conspiracy 8y ago
    Monopoly, really? One single corporation was going to control the whole cabal? You are misrepresenting facts.
    - fein 8y ago
      Would you prefer cabal? It was a certain group of a limited number of people who could grow, with nothing in the lines of allowing private growers to create startups.
      - gm-conspiracy 8y ago
        Oligopoloy.
- dang 8y ago
  Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to Hacker News.
SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
I’m not sure on the answer, but I definitely want to make sure you don’t think Canada is a state in the US ;)
- verelo 8y ago
  And thank goodness for that!
  - splintercell 8y ago
    The feeling is mutual.
- mixmastamyk 8y ago
  State is often a synonym of country.
  - SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
    Yes, that’s true. Now how many countries would the US recently have watched change their laws around pot vs the discussion currently going on inside of US States? Is being technically true better than a contextual joke?
nomocrypto 8y ago
Once we figure out how to keep minorities in prison easily, marijuana will become completely legal in the US.
- drb91 8y ago
  I agree FWIW, but I suspect capitalists would be fine discriminating blindly against all colors of a lower class. Race has always been an effective means to this end in America: if the people feeding your wallet are at each other’s throat, they might not notice who’s pocketing the cash.
  - gardnr 8y ago
    I wonder if this got downvoted for the racial sentiment or anti-capitalist view.
    - nomocrypto 8y ago
      Well, it’s HN so both are equally likely. Edit: it’s like y’all’re allergic to satire.
laretluval 8y ago
Possible steps in that direction https://reason.com/blog/2018/06/08/trump-endorses-marijuana-federalism-bill https://reason.com/blog/2018/06/08/trump-endorses-marijuana-...
- adventured 8y ago
  You're being downvoted because it's Trump, which is bullshit. It's the first time in modern US history that a sitting President has come anywhere close to declaring support for or proclaiming he'd be ok with the Federal Government legalizing recreational marijuana consumption. The reason for that, is because Trump is an aggressive populist that doesn't particularly care about entrenched, ancient political live wires. He'll feel entirely free to respond to the Trump voting base as its opinion gradually changes in favor of legalization (as it largely has).
  - int_19h 8y ago
    The problem is that legalization of cannabis in US was never actually about cannabis per se. It was about this: "The primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races." "Reefer makes darkies think they're as good as white men." "Marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing." "There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others." Now, these quotes are from the pre-WW2 period, when this insanity first began. But they lingered for a lot longer than that, even if the language changed. This is from the Nixon era: "You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities," Ehrlichman said. "We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did." In other words, it was always a weapon in the "culture war". And that is kinda at another peak right now, so I'm not too optimistic about this happening in US until it's over.
Alex3917 8y ago
> I wonder how many state has to legalize it before the federal government in USA is forced to change their classification. It's already arguably legal under federal law under the equal protection clause because congress legalized it in DC. As far as I know the feds aren't locking anyone up for possession of small amounts. E.g.: https://novacriminalattorney.com/marijuana/marijuana-legalization-same-sex-marriage-and-the-14th-amendment/ https://novacriminalattorney.com/marijuana/marijuana-legaliz...
- ilyanep 8y ago
  Am I missing something or is your link making the exact opposite point that you made?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - nzealand 8y ago
    You are not missing anything. The link does make the exact opposite point: "you will not be able to argue that you should be protected by the Constitution."
  - Alex3917 8y ago
    In this case the author is talking about using the 14th amendment to strike down state laws, but I was just talking about federal law. E.g. if the federal government allows people in DC to do something, then it has to allow everyone else to do that thing also. The author is right that strictly speaking the equal protection clause only applies to state laws, but the supreme court has also retroactively applied it to federal laws as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolling_v._Sharpe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolling_v._Sharpe
  - dpatru 8y ago
    The parent post was arguing that it would be hard to prosecute marijuana possession under federal law because federal law allows possession in DC. The link argues that state laws against marijuana are not affected by federal law. So in Virginia, you won't be able to escape prosecution for marijuana possession under Virginia's law just because it is not illegal under federal law or another state's law.
gm-conspiracy 8y ago
Once the states make enough revenue from the recreational sales to out-lobby the pharmaceutical companies and their IP monies.
Tiktaalik 8y ago
States starting to legalize it was likely a big part of why the Canadian government became comfortable with the idea of legalizing it. The idea of legalization, or at least decriminalization, has been floating around in Canada since the 90s, but a major talking point against the idea has been that it would compromise Canada's relationship with the USA. Obviously as internal parts of the USA are legalizing it this is no longer so much of a concern.
- cageface 8y ago
  I wonder if this has anything to do with the recent breakdown in US-Canada relations? Maybe the Canadians are less concerned with offending us now?
  - emilr 8y ago
    This is the result of a campaign promise made in 2015.
    - echlebek 8y ago
      Yes, it's been in the works for years and a multi-billion dollar industry has grown up around recreational cannabis already. Canopy Growth was listed on the NYSE this year. https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/WEED:CN https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/WEED:CN
- 1over137 8y ago
  Since way before the 90s my young friend! :) Check out the 1979 federal election debate, fast forward to 1:11:00. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfDSimvCFY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfDSimvCFY
digianarchist 8y ago
Couldn't the states introduce a constitutional amendment if 2/3 agree on legalisation?

I wonder how many state has to legalize it before the federal government in USA is forced to change their classification. It seems like more and more state will legalize it over time anyways.

KempFood 8y ago

Maybe in another 40 years. People aren’t smart, they are as dumb as nails. Sad!

fein 8y ago
The people aren't really the ones making the decision. Here in Ohio, for example, we didn't have a vote on recreational, instead we had a vote on a government sanctioned monopoly possibly leading the way to recreational. If there was some sort of state issue that could be voted on which was "regulate it like we do garden tomatoes", it would pass. Leadership has prevented this, not your cartoon idea of the oh so ignorant voter base. Too often we blame the salt of the earth people for things the media has done. Rule by multi millionaire propagandists.
- thaumasiotes 8y ago
  According to wikipedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initiatives_and_referendums_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initiatives_and_referendums_in... ) and ballotpedia ( https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Indirect_initiative_statute https://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Indirect_initiative_s... ), Ohio allows indirect initiatives. Meaning that if you were right about the voting base, it would be easy to legalize recreational marijuana without worrying what the leadership thought. > In the indirect form, initiative sponsors collect signatures and once the signatures are collected, the measure is taken up by the state legislature in their state. The legislature has these options: > Enact the measure as written in the petition. > Refuse to act on the measure, in which case it goes on the ballot. https://ballotpedia.org/Initiated_state_statute https://ballotpedia.org/Initiated_state_statute The leadership is not capable of preventing legalization if the salt of the earth is in favor of it.
  - fein 8y ago
    The salt of the earth doesn't give a shit about the local government; they just want to be left alone for the most part. The issue is getting the signatures in the first place, which requires canvassing, which requires paying someone to organize all of that. The last example of a successful canvassing that we had was a grab at a monopoly over growing ops, which was funded partly by a former member of the boy band NSYNC. The other hurdle is approval by the legislature. In Ohio it's not as simple as "get signatures, get on the ballot".
    - thaumasiotes 8y ago
      > The other hurdle is approval by the legislature. In Ohio it's not as simple as "get signatures, get on the ballot". I'm open to more specialized information, but the description on ballotpedia strongly implies that it is that simple. Specifically, it says that the steps are: 1. Get signatures. 2. The legislature must consider the initiative, either approving or rejecting it. 3a. If the legislature approves the initiative, it becomes law without having to go on the ballot. 3b. If the legislature rejects the initiative, it goes on the ballot. Thus, once you have signatures, the worst case is that you go straight onto the ballot, and the best case is that you become law without needing to. Theoretically, it could be possible for the legislature to sit on the initiative without ever approving or rejecting it. All I'm working off here is a cursory description of the law of several states including Ohio. Do you have relevant knowledge of Ohio law?
- charlex815 8y ago
  Politicians are more often mirrors of society than agents of change. Demand change from them, they aren't reading Hacker News. If they refuse change, campaign against them.
  - anoncoward111 8y ago
    >campaign against them And then suddenly when the death threats and FBI audits and etc start showing up in your life, and you lose the campaign anyway, you'll say to yourself, "shit, this isn't a democracy we're living in, this is just a mafia state."
    - koverda 8y ago
      Tinfoil hats are this way.
      - anoncoward111 8y ago
        Go run for office then. Surely it can't be that hard and daunting.
      - api 8y ago
        Meh. Faraday mesh hats work much better.
- gm-conspiracy 8y ago
  Monopoly, really? One single corporation was going to control the whole cabal? You are misrepresenting facts.
  - fein 8y ago
    Would you prefer cabal? It was a certain group of a limited number of people who could grow, with nothing in the lines of allowing private growers to create startups.
    - gm-conspiracy 8y ago
      Oligopoloy.
dang 8y ago
Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to Hacker News.

SlowRobotAhead 8y ago

I’m not sure on the answer, but I definitely want to make sure you don’t think Canada is a state in the US ;)

verelo 8y ago
And thank goodness for that!
- splintercell 8y ago
  The feeling is mutual.
mixmastamyk 8y ago
State is often a synonym of country.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  Yes, that’s true. Now how many countries would the US recently have watched change their laws around pot vs the discussion currently going on inside of US States? Is being technically true better than a contextual joke?

nomocrypto 8y ago

Once we figure out how to keep minorities in prison easily, marijuana will become completely legal in the US.

drb91 8y ago
I agree FWIW, but I suspect capitalists would be fine discriminating blindly against all colors of a lower class. Race has always been an effective means to this end in America: if the people feeding your wallet are at each other’s throat, they might not notice who’s pocketing the cash.
- gardnr 8y ago
  I wonder if this got downvoted for the racial sentiment or anti-capitalist view.
  - nomocrypto 8y ago
    Well, it’s HN so both are equally likely. Edit: it’s like y’all’re allergic to satire.

laretluval 8y ago

Possible steps in that direction https://reason.com/blog/2018/06/08/trump-endorses-marijuana-federalism-bill https://reason.com/blog/2018/06/08/trump-endorses-marijuana-...

adventured 8y ago
You're being downvoted because it's Trump, which is bullshit. It's the first time in modern US history that a sitting President has come anywhere close to declaring support for or proclaiming he'd be ok with the Federal Government legalizing recreational marijuana consumption. The reason for that, is because Trump is an aggressive populist that doesn't particularly care about entrenched, ancient political live wires. He'll feel entirely free to respond to the Trump voting base as its opinion gradually changes in favor of legalization (as it largely has).
- int_19h 8y ago
  The problem is that legalization of cannabis in US was never actually about cannabis per se. It was about this: "The primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races." "Reefer makes darkies think they're as good as white men." "Marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing." "There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others." Now, these quotes are from the pre-WW2 period, when this insanity first began. But they lingered for a lot longer than that, even if the language changed. This is from the Nixon era: "You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities," Ehrlichman said. "We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did." In other words, it was always a weapon in the "culture war". And that is kinda at another peak right now, so I'm not too optimistic about this happening in US until it's over.

Alex3917 8y ago

> I wonder how many state has to legalize it before the federal government in USA is forced to change their classification. It's already arguably legal under federal law under the equal protection clause because congress legalized it in DC. As far as I know the feds aren't locking anyone up for possession of small amounts. E.g.: https://novacriminalattorney.com/marijuana/marijuana-legalization-same-sex-marriage-and-the-14th-amendment/ https://novacriminalattorney.com/marijuana/marijuana-legaliz...

ilyanep 8y ago
Am I missing something or is your link making the exact opposite point that you made?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- nzealand 8y ago
  You are not missing anything. The link does make the exact opposite point: "you will not be able to argue that you should be protected by the Constitution."
- Alex3917 8y ago
  In this case the author is talking about using the 14th amendment to strike down state laws, but I was just talking about federal law. E.g. if the federal government allows people in DC to do something, then it has to allow everyone else to do that thing also. The author is right that strictly speaking the equal protection clause only applies to state laws, but the supreme court has also retroactively applied it to federal laws as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolling_v._Sharpe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolling_v._Sharpe
- dpatru 8y ago
  The parent post was arguing that it would be hard to prosecute marijuana possession under federal law because federal law allows possession in DC. The link argues that state laws against marijuana are not affected by federal law. So in Virginia, you won't be able to escape prosecution for marijuana possession under Virginia's law just because it is not illegal under federal law or another state's law.

gm-conspiracy 8y ago

Once the states make enough revenue from the recreational sales to out-lobby the pharmaceutical companies and their IP monies.

Tiktaalik 8y ago

States starting to legalize it was likely a big part of why the Canadian government became comfortable with the idea of legalizing it. The idea of legalization, or at least decriminalization, has been floating around in Canada since the 90s, but a major talking point against the idea has been that it would compromise Canada's relationship with the USA. Obviously as internal parts of the USA are legalizing it this is no longer so much of a concern.

cageface 8y ago
I wonder if this has anything to do with the recent breakdown in US-Canada relations? Maybe the Canadians are less concerned with offending us now?
- emilr 8y ago
  This is the result of a campaign promise made in 2015.
  - echlebek 8y ago
    Yes, it's been in the works for years and a multi-billion dollar industry has grown up around recreational cannabis already. Canopy Growth was listed on the NYSE this year. https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/WEED:CN https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/WEED:CN
1over137 8y ago
Since way before the 90s my young friend! :) Check out the 1979 federal election debate, fast forward to 1:11:00. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfDSimvCFY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBfDSimvCFY

digianarchist 8y ago

Couldn't the states introduce a constitutional amendment if 2/3 agree on legalisation?