AK - Governor Hopes to Re-Criminalize Pot

[Hash]

Stymied by the courts, Alaska's governor is looking for other ways to toughen Alaska's antimarijuana laws.

Pot laws are looser in Alaska than just about anywhere else in the country. Possessing small amounts of the drug for personal use is a privacy right protected under the state's constitution, the Alaska Supreme Court has upheld. Alaska is one of 11 states that allows the use of medical marijuana.

Republican Gov. Frank Murkowski wants state lawmakers to re-criminalize the drug, asking them to consider evidence of the marijuana's dangers that he contends should trump the right-to-privacy rulings.

The "Alaska Supreme Court has shown an unwillingness to reconsider the latest scientific evidence on the harmful effects of marijuana," Murkowski wrote to state Senate President Ben Stevens in introducing his proposed legislation. "A rational evaluation of marijuana's harmful effects must occur, and the Legislature should do that -- not the courts."

The state's marijuana laws have been shaped by 30 years of court decisions and voter referendums. In 1975, the state Supreme Court made it legal for adult Alaskans to possess a small amount of marijuana in their homes for personal use in the case of Ravin v. State.

In 1990 a successful voter initiative criminalized all amounts of pot. Then in 2003, the Alaska Court of Appeals reversed that in the case of North Pole resident David Noy. The court said privacy rights guaranteed in the Alaska Constitution can't be taken away by voters or legislators.

The Supreme Court declined the state's request last September to reconsider the Noy case, setting the legal possession limit at 4 ounces of marijuana.

Bill Satterberg, the Fairbanks attorney who filed the Appeals Court petition in the Noy case, says the debate has swung from one side to the other, but the appellate court's decision in Noy strikes a balance.

And in November, a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana and possibly tax it similarly to alcohol and cigarettes failed to pass, with 44 percent of the vote.

"I think the pendulum has swung to too permissive. The (legalization initiative) was too permissive, in my opinion," Satterberg said. "Then it swings the other way, and it is too restrictive."

Murkowski's bill would make possession of 4 ounces of marijuana or more a felony and possession of up to 4 ounces a misdemeanor.

Current law makes it a misdemeanor to possess up to a half-pound of marijuana.

But most importantly, one of the bill's authors contends, going through the Legislature will allow a weighty body of evidence on the dangers of marijuana to be entered into the record.

The state can take the record of evidence back to the courts, where such information was missing when earlier rulings were made, said Dean Guaneli, chief assistant attorney general.

The hearings spurred by the bill will allow the state to enter evidence that marijuana poses a threat to public health "that justifies prohibiting its use and possession in this state, even by adults in private," the bill's language says.

That way, the courts will be able to look at that evidence the next time the privacy issue is considered in a marijuana case.

"The first thing the courts do is look to the legislative record," Guaneli said. "If the legislative reasons are better, the courts' constitutional analysis will change."

Satterberg said he doubts the state's efforts to re-criminalize marijuana are a good use of resources, saying there are better things to do than debate marijuana's effects. The bill, if it passes, would raise police and court costs and make instant felons out many Alaska residents, he said.

But he can see the Murkowski bill passing through the Legislature. Lawmakers may be reluctant to be seen as coming out in favor of drugs, he said.

"The problem is, it's a mother, God, apple pie thing," he said.

Tim Hinterberger, a University of Alaska Anchorage professor and one of the campaign organizers of the failed initiative to legalize marijuana, said lawmakers should consider that 134,647 voters supported the measure in November.

"I'm hopeful that our legislators are a bit more in tune with the will of the people than that," he said. "I don't think the momentum is on the side of returning to prohibition."

Guaneli said he believes Murkowski's bill will pass and be upheld in the courts, ending the state's 30-year debate over privacy and pot.

"I think once the courts say the Legislature has good grounds for doing this, the issue will be put to rest," he said.



Source: Anchorage Daily News (AK)
Copyright: 2005 The Anchorage Daily News
Contact: letters@adn.com
Website: http://www.adn.com/

[J842P]

I'd just like to see this "new evidence of marijuana's dangers"...

[flashfyre]

Originally Posted by j842p

I'd just like to see this "new evidence of marijuana's dangers"...

the danger is admitting the drug war is a failure, thus making the US Government appear incompetent, tyrannical or just plain foolish.

also what would all those law enforcement and justice infrastructure do without all these bad pot smokers to hunt down ?

The government must drive home the idea, constantly, that we cannot manage our own live and decisions....otherwise, they would not be able to justify the mass of taxes we pay.

[flashfyre]

another way to put it :

"Anti-marijuana laws are nothing more than welfare for the police state"