MPP UPDATE #6 -

By Rob Kampia

As the marijuana policy reform movement continues to pass bills and initiatives on the local and state levels, MPP’s national strategy for regulating marijuana like alcohol is becoming more and more refined.

The goal, of course, is to (1) change federal law to allow states to determine their own marijuana policies, and (2) change the laws of all 50 states and the District of Columbia so that adults may use and obtain marijuana from a legally regulated market.

It is our assumption that Congress will not be the first legislative body to act; consequently, the first act to repeal marijuana prohibition will need to be passed in a state.

So what state will be the first? No one can be sure, so MPP and the MPP grants program have launched a strategy to fund the passage of statewide bills and ballot initiatives in the states that are most likely to bow out of marijuana prohibition.

In Nevada, MPP has already qualified a tax-and-regulate initiative for the November 2006 ballot, and MPP is lobbying for a similar bill in the Vermont Legislature. And, given that a more radical initiative received 44% of the vote in Alaska in November 2004, MPP hopes to run a statewide ballot initiative there in November 2008.

In California, 64% of Oakland voters passed a local tax-and-regulate initiative in November 2004, and a slate of similar initiatives will be placed on local ballots statewide in November 2006. If these initiatives pass, a statewide initiative is likely in November 2008.

Two organizations in Colorado -- Sensible Colorado and SAFER (Safer Alternatives for Enjoyable Recreation) -- are placing local initiatives on the Denver and Telluride ballots in November 2005 to inspire a statewide debate and tax-and-regulate bill in the state legislature in January 2006.

Similarly, the Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii plans to pass a local initiative in November 2006 to inspire a statewide debate and bill in its legislature in January 2007.

Local initiative victories in Seattle and more than 20 communities in Massachusetts have given the King County Bar Association and the Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts hope that they can pass statewide ballot initiatives in Washington and Massachusetts, respectively, after doing additional organizing over the next few years.

In New Hampshire, the House voted 295–60 to defeat a bill that would have wiped out marijuana prohibition entirely, replacing it with nothing. While this is far from a win, the vote is encouraging because literally no one lobbied for or spent money trying to pass the radical legislation. MPP plans to invest resources to pass similar legislation in 2007.

MPP also views Arizona, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Montana, New Mexico, and Oregon as ripe for statewide organizing and, ultimately, tax-and-regulate initiatives.

The MPP grants program is interested in funding full-time organizers in Arizona, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, and Oregon. (Please see http://www.mpp.org/grants for information on how to apply for a grant.)

By pushing hard in Nevada and Vermont now—and building coalitions, debating state bills, and passing local initiatives in 14 other states over the next few years—we hope to create a checkerboard of 16 states that will bow out of prohibition between November 2006 and, say, November 2012.

With 16 states -- including California -- clamoring for change, the goal would then be to push Congress and the president to pass federal legislation, which would free the remaining 34 states and the District of Columbia to follow suit by passing their own tax-and-regulate laws.

If these remaining steps can be accomplished by 2017, our nation’s experiment with marijuana prohibition would have lasted an ugly 80 years.

Sensible Colorado: sensiblecolorado.org
SAFER: saferchoice.org
Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii : dpfhi.org
King County Bar Association : kcba.org/druglaw/index.html
Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts: dpfma.org