Lest it seem that I am becoming a men’s rights advocate let’s take a look at another burning topic. Increasingly, State laws are legalizing marijuana for medicine and for recreation and in some cases prohibiting local law enforcement from participating in US Federal drug enforcement efforts against licensed marijuana industry. This collision between Federal and State Laws has been part and parcel to the political dialogue since the Confederate Congress first enacted the current US constitution in the 18th century. But smoke is rising warning about a new holocaust of federalist Zealots vs the People of the United States.
Noise is growing to the effect that Article VI of the Constitution makes state laws legalizing marijuana illegitimate, and acts of usurpation. In order to support this claim the proponents are trying to link legal cannabis with ownership of humans. This argument claims that the sixth article makes federal law supreme over state law and that the work of the abolitionists was an attempt to enforce this article. In a classic paper tiger fallacy they try to link cannabis proponents to the abuse of the 10th amendment held by southern Democrats in the 19th century. ( I resist with great effort the use of the terms Demoncrats and Reproblicans.)
But that attack threatens the very integrity of the nation. Local laws exist that legalize and forbid any number of things. Where federal laws such as the DOT regulations apply, state laws routinely override them to accommodate prevailing conditions. Where the constitution clearly affords the right to bear weapons intended for combat and homicide, city ordinances and extra governmental regulations such as the ATF regs. are accepted as normal and legal. The rational application of colliding laws is that the court of jurisdiction established by the entity with the more restrictive law holds sway. State maximum speed limit may be 85mph but the local city has established a max of 35 so while passing through on the state hwy you slow down or pay the fine. Most people understand and are compliant with this.
But there is a fundamental difference in the state cannabis laws. I can’t be expert on them all, not my field. But it seems that most places the laws are Allowing something the fed does not. So that would mean the fed law does hold sway, but only in federal courts. That works. But the current argument says that since the federal law criminalizes cannabis, the states and cities must ignore their state law and enforce the federal law, judges must enforce the federal law in sentencing. They cite the laws legalizing slavery and compare the legalization of cannabis to sedition and human trafficking.
Leaving aside the issue of extra-governmental agencies and their regulations and the fact that these, simply put, are not the USSC and therefore not law; Article VI itself is the key to this conflict. The second paragraph of Article VI is the heart of this issue. Called the Supremacy Clause it reads:
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
We see that the constitution itself is certainly supreme. The rights reserved to the fed and state, as well as those remainder which accrue to the individual are Supreme Law of the land. Further, the USSC is Supreme. But if we take a closer look, the words “in pursuance thereof” interrupt the flow a bit. What is being pursued is the Constitution. So any law which does not derive from the rights and privileges in the written Constitution are not enforceable against the states or the individual. Because they are not Supreme law of the land.
Slavery is and always was a violation of the written constitution. Black men may not have counted as a full person under the original document, but even then there was no provision for the ownership of fractional people, much less whole people. So the argument from abolition has no credibility. Nor does the argument from sedition, the cannabis laws in even the most contorted versions don’t advocate secession, impinging the bill of rights, or preventing the fed from enforcing it’s laws. At most they may prevent local law enforcement from enforcing or reporting violations of federal regulations governing the schedule of banned drugs with regard to one species that grows wild on all the temperate continents of the earth. There may even be a grow room somewhere in Antarctica, I really would have no way of knowing.
Whatever you may feel about the recreational use of cannabis, the medicinal benefits are undeniable. The only real drive behind it’s abolition is money. It’s a plant, so patenting it is awkward for drug manufacturers, criminal cartels can’t make a profit on something that is legal and freely available, and law enforcement receive financial gain for the individual officer when they pursue a user or supplier of cannabis. House and personal property of every person on the premises of a raid are subject to unconstitutional seizure and resale to the personal benefit of members of the departments or agencies involved in the raid. This takes the form of rec-centers, break-rooms, retirement funds, financial aid funds, etc.
Corruption drives the anti-cannabis lobby. Think about that next time someone starts preaching the evils of marijuana and the rebellious slave states that legalize it. I don’t recommend the recreational use of alcohol or cannabis, but I don’t ostracize the toker anymore than the tippler.