Put Wise Controls on Pot Law

Gov. Gray Davis has suggested he will veto a bill that lays out details for implementing Proposition 215, the controversial initiative that voters passed in 1996 to legalize the medical use of marijuana. Davis spokesman Michael Bustamante said the governor would be “hard pressed� to sign the bill, by state Sen. John Vasconcellos (D-Santa Clara), because it would put California in the position of legalizing a drug that the federal government bans altogether.

Davis’ veto wouldn’t settle a thing. California would still be stuck with a vague law impossible to put into effect. What Davis ought to do is work with Vasconcellos to tighten the bill’s description of legal uses of marijuana and make it more palatable to moderates including himself. A real solution will require a change in federal drug laws, but a well-crafted bill would help state law enforcement officials as they try to decide what to allow.

Washington’s all-out ban on the medical use of marijuana is needlessly stringent. While most experts agree that marijuana can alleviate pain and nausea in patients suffering from life-threatening diseases like AIDS and cancer, federal law still classifies marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug, meaning a substance without medicinal value. Drugs arguably more dangerous, like morphine and cocaine, by contrast may be prescribed as Schedule 2 drugs.

Two revisions to the Vasconcellos measure are key:

* Tighten wording. The bill is almost as irresponsibly open-ended as Proposition 215, legalizing the use of pot not only for AIDS and cancer but for many lesser conditions. Proposition 215 was sold to voters as a way of helping people cope with grave illnesses; that’s how it should be implemented.

* Limit scope. Most Californians who supported Proposition 215 no doubt assumed that seriously ill people who smoke marijuana would do so discreetly. But Vasconcellos’ bill wrongly seeks to permit public smoking of medicinal marijuana just about everywhere cigarettes can be legally smoked.

The debate over Proposition 215 has officials in Sacramento and Washington in a standoff. Federal drug czar Barry McCaffrey has derided the initiative as “a Cheech and Chong show� that approves of drug use. Vasconcellos has snapped back that “the federal government is so hysterical and unresponsive on this issue that I am not going to let them dictate policy.�

Davis, rather than pull out his veto pen, should work with the Legislature. A carefully monitored, tightly limited implementation of Proposition 215 would be the best first step.