Sacramento Bee Editorial
Calls for Ordinance Forbidding Medical Marijuana Use In Public --
In the Closet Perhaps?
(Ed. note: These people seem to think that the
medical use of marijuana is something shameful. Tobacco addicts can (rightfully) stand out
on the street and give themselves maintenance doses of their drug, and alcohol users can
do the same in designated public places, but people with serious medical conditions are
supposed to hide at home, in the closet perhaps. It should
be obvious to anyone not addicted to prohibition that medical marijuana users may not be
able to go home every time they need their medication. Some may not even have homes to go
to. Certainly, medical marijuana users should be considerate of the rights and feelings of
others. But then so should newspaper editors.)
Sacramento Bee
See
Sacramento County
Makes Public Use of Medical Marijuana Subject To Six Months In Jail - AIDS Patient
Defiant!
opinion@sacbee.com
http://www.sacbee.com/
March 17, 1998
Keep Pot Private: Ordinance Needed To Ban Public Smoking
When California voters in 1996 approved Proposition 215 to improve access to medicinal
marijuana for the seriously ill, they did not envision patients firing up joints in public
places. Rather, the idea was to allow marijuana to be used
discreetly and privately, particularly given its continued status as an illegal
substance under federal law for any state citizen, healthy or sick.
Yet like many parts of this flawed measure, Proposition 215 did not address where the
sick could and could not smoke. Its vagueness begs for clarification. Local governments
throughout the state are now busy writing their own rules to restrict public marijuana
smoking. When the Sacramento County Board Supervisors holds a public hearing on the issue
today, it should follow the advice of District Attorney Jan
Scully and pursue an ordinance banning pot use in restaurants and other public places.
The need for a local ordinance was demonstrated last summer, when medicinal marijuana
activist Ryan Landers, who is battling AIDS, went with some friends to the Thursday night
market on the K Street Mall. After ordering a chicken kabob sandwich at a restaurant, he
walked outside and began smoking a joint until he was arrested by police. Charges were
later dropped because Scully’s office had the legal backing of neither Proposition
215 nor a local ordinance.
Scully’s idea is to make public smoking of medicinal
marijuana subject to a $1,000 fine.
That is a way to send a
strong public signal without turning these patients into jail inmates.
The advocates of medicinal marijuana should realize that laws
such as these are ultimately to their advantage. Public smoking of marijuana threatens to
turn sympathizers into opponents. The measure was sold on the basis that the
terminally ill deserved medical relief that marijuana allegedly can provide. Flaunting the drug in public wasn’t what voters had in mind.
For patients desiring a dinner on the town, smoke the joint at home first. That’s not
too much to ask.
Supported