The marijuana industry across the U.S. has been in quite a topsy-turvy state for some time now as the ongoing battle between state and federal regulators has made the market difficult to dissect from a legal perspective. A new bill coming to the federal government may help solve this issue of power dynamic between what the states deserve and what the national government would like to see.
There are currently nine states in the U.S. that allow the use of adult-use recreational cannabis. These states have worked to grow quite sizable markets on growing, distribution and the individual retailers who sell the plants to the public. This means that anyone over the age of 21 can purchase marijuana in its varying forms throughout these states. This has been a large paradigm shift to the way that marijuana has been dealt with in the U.S. up until the past five to ten years. The recreational markets in these states are in a direct defiance to the law of the federal government. The U.S. government states that cannabis is currently a Schedule I narcotic. This means that from their perspective, cannabis has no potential for use in a medicinal setting as well as having a high possibility of addition. Both of these statements have been refuted many times by scientific journals and doctors alike around the world. The scheduling of the substance mostly refers to the paranoia surrounding the substance after a series of propaganda was released back in the early 20th century. It very obviously appears that the legislation needs to change, and this is precisely why the federal government has been hesitant to interfere fully with these legal markets.
A new bill has come out and could likely be signed into law in the coming weeks known as the Marijuana STATES act. The bill would effectively amend the substances scheduling on the Controlled Substances Act, and allow states the right to control their own internal marijuana industries. According to one report “ legal weed has flourished only because federal law hasn’t been enforced. The medical-marijuana business, still small, been protected for years by a rider to appropriations bills that bars federal money from funding their prosecution.”
The Obama administration was the first to offer the states some sort of protection under what is known as the “Cole Memo.” The Cole Memo meant that federal prosecutors had to take cannabis off of their priority in terms of prosecution, and thus states could act accordingly. The main opponent who worked to rescind this bill in the early parts of this year has been Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Sessions has been the primary reason that no new laws have been put into place.
The new STATES Act has been pushed forward by several individuals in government such as Senator Cory Gardner and Elizabeth Warren. The new bill aims at changing the current state of cannabis, and hopes to change the legislation that for too long, has not reflected at all the view of the public on cannabis. The market on cannabis in the U.S. and its legal status is still very new, which means that these small steps are all working in conjunction to help produce a better way for the country to deal with the use of legal cannabis nationwide. The hopes are high that these steps will all take the industry in the right direction, allowing the market to function as it should, and giving better access to cannabis for those who wish to use it and those who need it.
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