Drug Enforcement Administration agents in Santa Cruz, Calif. recently raided a farm that was growing marijuana for medicinal purposes. The DEA, in their raid of the Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana’s farm, seized 167 plants and arrested the founders of the organization. The DEA was legally justified in its raid. It is illegal under federal law to grow or use marijuana for medicinal purposes, although local Santa Cruz law permits it.
DEA officials assure that they will make no distinction between marijuana grown and sold for commercial purposes and marijuana grown and used for medicinal purposes. Because of this policy, the DEA is taking a lot of flak from Santa Cruz residents and local officials.
WAMM staged a public rally on the steps of city hall days after the raid on their farm and distributed marijuana to their patients. The DEA is legally entitled to combat the medicinal marijuana, but are those crippled, terminally ill tokers doing anybody any harm?
In recent years, Santa Cruz has been the nation’s advocate of using marijuana to treat patients with unusually painful illnesses. In 1996, Santa Cruz approved a proposition that allowed marijuana to be used for medicinal purposes.
The owners of the aforementioned marijuana plot, Mike and Valerie Corral, distribute the plant to their patients free of charge. Although I’m sure that the Corrals’ campaign is to end human suffering and not to take the first steps in the legalization of marijuana, it seems that they and other Santa Cruz residents are pushing their luck.
In 2000, the city council approved an ordinance that allowed marijuana to be grown and used without a prescription. Santa Cruz should keep in mind that although they are entitled to pass their own state and local laws, they are still under federal jurisdiction. “Growing and using marijuana without a prescription” is probably at the top of the DEA’s list of “Reasons to Arrest People.”
Marijuana use for medicinal purposes is not the most terrible act, but users should take care not to seem overly excited about using it.
Perhaps users/distributors would be less subject to government chastisement if they seemed more reluctant to use that forbidden plant. Users could publicly express their sorrow and disappointment at falling to the last-ditch effort of marijuana use, while gratefully indulging in private.
As for the DEA, who can blame them? Such powerful government entities have to remind other cities like Santa Cruz around the country who is really calling the shots.
Josh Foreman is a junior communication major.