The judicial branch weighs in on employee marijuana rights, drug doggies, and more.

Sooner or later, everything winds up in court. You spilled a scalding cup of java on your nads at the McDonald’s drive-through; the insurance company refuses to pay for “water damage”; you’re tired of arsenic in the drinking water; ya feel like suing Costco . . . just because. And now that cannabis is entering the mainstream, it’s time to lawyer up, in this week’s legal round-up.

Legal Weed, But Not if You Have a Job
Colorado’s Supreme Court ruled last week that, regardless of the state’s legalization of marijuana, an employer can fire a worker who uses cannabis, even for medical reasons. The case couldn’t have had a more sympathetic poster boy: Brandon Coats, a 34-year-old quadriplegic, was a model employee, but was fired by Dish Network in 2010 after failing a random company drug test. (As if we needed another reason to hate television service providers.) Medical pot has been legal in Colorado since 2000, and Coats had a doctor’s authorization. He never smoked weed at work—nor was he ever under the influence during the day; he used cannabis in the evenings to help with sleep, muscle spasms, and stiffness. Even Dish doesn’t dispute this assertion. Nevertheless, a failed drug test won’t fly in the Zero Tolerance zone, and so, even though his home use was legal and off-duty, the company used their drug policy to terminate Coats.

While both medical and recreational marijuana are legal in Colorado, the court agreed unanimously (6-0) with the satellite television company, stating that laws that protect employees from being fired for “lawful activities” hold water only when those activities are legal under bothstate and federal law. Dish officials said they were as pleased as (non-alcoholic) punch with the decision: “As a national employer, Dish remains committed to a drug-free workplace and compliance with federal law.” Obviously, this ruling may waft over to Washington, which, like Colorado, has legalized recreational cannabis and is one of the 23 medical-MJ states. There’s only one solution to all this nonsense: Legalize cannabis at the federal level.

Good Doggy!
Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional for the police to hold suspects at traffic stops without probable cause. That’s good news for folks with trunkloads full of contraband; cops can’t keep you waiting until the drug-sniffing dogs show up. (In Washington, of course, you’re allowed to drive around with up to an ounce of weed in your vehicle, though it’s probably not a great idea.) In the 6-3 decision, the justices ruled that holding a vehicle for even a few minutes violates the Constitution’s unreasonable-seizure shield. Everyone’s favorite justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, wrote in her opinion: “Police may not prolong detention of a car and driver beyond the time reasonably required to address the traffic violation.”

As noted in my cover story (“Fear & Loathing in Legal Territory,” Feb. 4, 2015), drug-sniffing canines here in Washington are being retrained for other tasks, as the smell of ganja is no longer a reason for suspicion.

Blazing on the Front Porch
While I am not a lawyer by training, I have seen several episodes of Boston Legal (big fan of Bill Shatner’s over-the-top performances), and thus can conjecture. That may not be the correct term. Point is, I can extrapolate. So when I read about the Iowa Supreme Court affirming the right of a gal to be shitfaced drunk on her own porch, I’m seeing a green light for cannabis. In 2013, Patience Paye called the cops on her boyfriend. When officers showed up to investigate for domestic violence, they determined she was the aggressor, asked if she’d been drinking (she had indeed, with over three times the legal limit in her blood), and charged her with public intoxication. Paye’s lawyers appealed her conviction, making a case that her front steps weren’t public at all, and that she should never have been arrested. Patience was patient, and the Supreme Court saw her point, ruling last week that the porch of a private home isn’t considered public, so long as the resident hasn’t invited the general public to be there. It just follows, then, that if ya don’t invite the masses to smoke a fatty on your stoop, ya can’t be charged with public stonification. That’s just logical, man.

Canna-Bar
To make sure that these legal lawsuits and challenges continue to advance the cause, we now have the National Cannabis Bar Association! The goal of the newly formed NCBA is to provide attorneys who are specializing in cannabis a place to get stoned and talk shop. Well, that, and to provide a networking platform to share ideas and strategies for a rapidly changing industry and complex political landscape.

“Attorneys have long been at the forefront of the fight for cannabis legalization,” said executive director Shabnam Malek. “Now that 23 states and Washington, D.C., have some form of legalized cannabis, there is a clear need for an organization focused on the business aspects of law and cannabis.”

The NCBA board comprises legal eagles from six states (including Seattle attorney Mitzi Vaughn of Greenbridge Corporate Counsel). The organization is open not only to practicing attorneys, but to paralegals, law students, and retired lawyers who just want to get their hands on some of the legal chronic. On the advice of legal counsel, we withdraw that last statement.

The Feds finally hint that weed is not evil.

Michael Stusser’s column appears weekly on HigherGroundtv.com as well as the Seattle Weekly and other newspapers around the country.

Many of us seek an elevated state of mind. Our jobs stress us out, our relationships are challenging, world news is depressing, and we just want something to take the edge off. A glass of wine. A Valium. Or, in my case, a few hits of this funny weed called cannabis. I’m not apologizing; I’m overjoyed. Shockingly, the citizens of my fair state voted to legalize marijuana for recreational use, and, in addition to the massive tax revenue it’s generating for our political pinheads to spend wildly, it’s giving the rest of us yet another way to ease the pain—and occasionally burst out in uncontrollable laughter.

The prohibition on marijuana will come to an end. That’s a fact. While Washington is ahead of the curve, nationally a majority of our citizens support legalization of both recreational (54 percent) and medicinal (78 percent) marijuana. The real question will be what side you were on when the pot leaves came tumbling down. As with civil rights, gay marriage, and gun control, there are resistant, plodding, dimwitted late adopters who will oppose legalization just as the Temperance Movement (know as “drys” in their time) did while propping up the 18th Amendment. I try and be nice to these modern teetotaling crusaders. Maybe they just need a hug. Or a push. Or a puff.

Wonderful things are happening in the world of legal kush. Cartels are losing money and splitting town, domestic violence and teen drug rates are plummeting in legal states, and in places like New York that have decriminalized cannabis, arrests are down 75 percent. Best of all, as I write this, I am stoned to the bejesus on legal herb.

And while it’s great that Washington got the ball rolling with Initiative 502, our weed laws have serious deficiencies. Unlike the other four jurisdictions that legalized ganja—Colorado, Alaska, Oregon, and the District of Columbia—our stupid-ass statute doesn’t allow citizens to grow their own. While you and I may not want to devote our entire basements to grow lights and stinky Mary Jane plants, if we’re going to legalize an herb, we might as well allow citizens to be poticulturists. (DIY home brews got nuthin’ on the ganja-thumbs!)

Initiative 502 also did not address the medical-marijuana system that has been in place since passage of the Medical Use of Marijuana initiative in 1998. The resulting unregulated collection of dispensaries and collective gardens not only helped thousands of citizens cope with a wide variety of ailments, but opened the door to fly-by-night operators who don’t card, don’t pay taxes, and don’t look any different than the black market we’re attempting to snuff out.

Hearings intended clean up this Wild Weedy West are underway in our dysfunctional state legislature, with proposals ranging from the ridiculous (Sen. Ann Rivers originally wanted to eliminate smokeable pot) to the moderate (Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Wells envisions a single tax structure, home grows for all, and allowing well-established, rule-abiding dispensaries to get licenses). It’s looking as though the medical market will be folded into the recreational system (read: screwed), and patients may not only have to join a mandatory registry (I can see the NSA drooling now), but pay taxes on their meds.

In addition to addressing these ongoing issues, this column will ponder what it means to be high. It will explore the ways people are getting high (Weed-of-the-Month Club!), making money on people getting high (Marley Natural), and using cannabis for medicinal purposes, as well as an occasional rant about how hundreds of thousands of (mostly African-) American citizens are still being arrested every year for marijuana-related offenses. In short, I hope to elevate the dialogue on the legalization movement.

Let’s start with the latest on the weed watch.

• Last week the new Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, said that for certain medical conditions, marijuana may be helpful. The reason this is noteworthy is that marijuana’s therapeutic properties are news to the federal government, which still believes cannabis has zero medicinal value, listing it as a Schedule 1 narcotic along with meth and LSD.

• Washington got its first pot vending machine! Located in the Seattle Caregivers medical dispensary, the ZaZZZ machine contains edibles as well as bags of weed (but no Doritos). The high-tech contraption scans not only your medical-marijuana card (the automats are not yet in recreational stores), but also your driver’s license, then cross-checks the data with the biometrics from the machine’s camera. According to ZaZZZ’s maker, American Green, they’ll soon add security that will require customers to provide fingerprints or retinal scans, and track all purchases. Intrusive databases and speedy, anonymous, machine-distributed weed? Yeah, that’s not gonna set off any pothead paranoia alarms.

But what does the ZaZZZ portend? I worry that as we move from bud-tenders selling organic flowers to machines spitting out disposable vape pens, THC-infused energy drinks, and GummyBear edibles, the more this new era will look like fast food, Big Pharma, and cigarette machines of old.

A look back at the next five years.

 

As I write this on April 20, 2020, I’m impressed by how far the legalization movement has come since Washington and Colorado first voted to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012. I am still alarmed we’ve not yet overturned prohibition at the federal level, but let’s take a look at how far we’ve come.

STATES
Seventeen states have now legalized cannabis, including Minnesota, Florida, and, surprisingly, Arizona. The third time was a charm for California, which finally legalized weed after ballot initiatives were defeated in both 2010 and 2016. (In each of those elections, competing ballot measures confused and divided the already-stoned masses.)

Of the 17 states to fully legalize, tax, and regulate cannabis, only Hawaii and Massachusetts passed their laws through the legislative process. Aloha State Gov. David Ige said it best: “Sure, we could have had a ballot initiative, but we’re trying to save paper.” In 2018, Oregon became the first state to repeal legal cannabis, overturning the measure it passed in 2014. (Make up your mind, Dank Ducks.)

And who would have thought that Las Vegas would become the World’s Cannabis Capital over Denver, Seattle, or Berkeley? With dozens of 420-friendly resorts, StarBud cafes on every corner, and Amsterdam-themed casinos, Vegas, thankfully, is for adults again. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas . . . because no one can remember what the hell happened in Vegas.

ECONOMY
Marijuana is now a $26-billion-a-year industry, successfully eclipsing organic food, cosmetics, and the NFL in sales. It has also garnered more than $9 billion a year in tax revenue, funding roads, infrastructure, drug education, and the nationwide Green Electric Train system. New Jersey has shown the most dramatic turnaround, from bankruptcy in 2017 to a huge surplus after turning its Jersey Shore boardwalk back into a smoky, lowbrow bacchanal. An often-overlooked benefit of the new economy is jobs, more than 250,000 of which have been created, including web developers, specialized security, “manicurists,” and cannabis chefs.

GANJAPRENEURS
The Green Rush has led to products and services no one could have imagined back in 2012, including the word’s first digital vape phone (iStoned), Tesla’s HempRoadster, CannaAspirin (a Privateer Holdings and Bayer joint venture), and Virgin’s Flying HotBox Airline. WeedTourism is also booming with Bud ’n’ Breakfasts, guided Ganja Artwalks, and Stoned Symphony Nights. Mergers and acquisitions have been fast and furious in Internet marijuana businesses (which, unlike the plant, can cross state lines): Leafly was purchased by Yelp, WeedHire by Monster, Weedmaps by Groupon, and Higher Ground by Time/Warner. Surprisingly, the top celebrity-endorsed weed strain was not Willie Nelson’s Reserve, Snoop Chronic, or (Bob) Marley’s Natural, but Kardashian Kush, which—according to all reviews—consistently knocks you on your gigantic ass.

Edibles currently make up 55 percent of the market, CBD oils and concentrates another 15 percent, and elixirs 23 percent, leaving flower (buds) to make up only 7 percent of marijuana sales.

MEDICAL
In 1995 not a single state had passed a medical-marijuana law, and only 25 percent of those polled believed in legalizing the drug. By 2015, 23 states had legalized medical cannabis. As of today (4/20/20), 42 states have now passed medical-marijuana laws, leaving only eight without any form of medicinal-cannabis law on the books. (We love you, Oklahoma, but rally yer wagons: Even gay marriage is fully legal in your state now.)

Today over two and a half million Americans receive some sort of support from cannabis-related products. Shockingly, five states have even allowed health-care providers to cover and reimburse medical-marijuana patients under their policies, including the newly formed Green Group Health Cross.

SCHEDULE 2
Perhaps Obama’s defining moment was not his (overturned, then re-implemented) Affordable Care Act, but his last-minute 2016 Executive Order that took marijuana off the Schedule 1 list of the Controlled Substances Act and downgraded it to Schedule 2. Although Schedule 2 drugs are still deemed to have high potential for abuse, cannabis is now clearly recognized for its medical benefits, and available for prescriptions.

This controversial move by a “What the Hell Have I Got to Lose” president has allowed clinical research roadblocks to be removed, delivering conclusive proof that cannabinoids are effective on chronic seizures, shrinking brain tumors, slowing Crohn’s disease, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and even helping with erectile dysfunction (who knew?). This last finding moved the last bastion of elderly white Congressmen holding up medical-marijuana legislation to act in several Southern states.

HEMP
After being cultivated for more than 12,000 years, hemp was finally fully legalized in 2018 with the Industrial Hemp Farming Act. Bred for its strong fiber, the sober sister to sativa has now replaced timber and concrete as the main building material in new home construction. With only trace amounts of THC, hemp is being used for clothing and rope, and hempseed oil now makes up over half the nation’s fuel supply. Hemp toilet paper, however, was a colossal flop, and we’ll leave it at that.

THE WAR ON DRUGS
The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling, Black Guy vs. DEA, stunned the nation by allowing states that have legalized marijuana to release and expunge records for individuals who had been convicted of nonviolent marijuana-related crimes. This ruling opened the floodgates for hundreds of thousands of (mostly African-American) men who had been incarcerated for crimes which are now minor infractions or fully legal. The case has led to nationwide changes in drug policy, redirecting an estimated $50 billion a year that had been previously spent on the War on Drugs to address more serious crimes (not to mention giving each and every U.S. citizen free cable for life). Writing for the majority, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts commented, “In this particular case, it pains me to be consistent with my own values of states rights, individual liberties, unobtrusive government, and the pursuit of happiness.”

IT’S NOT ALL GOOD
As with any major public-policy change, there have been missteps in the movement. After plowing his golf cart into a set of extras on SuperBad 4, actor Seth Rogen became the first celebrity convicted of Driving Under the Influence of Marijuana. Blowing into a drugalyzer, Rogen registered a record THC level of 50 nanograms per milliliter. (Anything over five nanograms is the legal limit in Colorado.) America’s “If some is good, more is better” philosophy is kicking many smokers in the head, with THC levels skyrocketing to record heights. And while cannabis has still not been responsible for a single death the world over, the trend of “dabbing” (combusting highly concentrated cannabis with blowtorches and dab-rigs) is not only making pot smokers look like crack addicts, but energizing the “This is Your Brain on Dabs” antidrug crowd.

An active opposition still funds anti-marijuana campaigns (including Recall Cannabis efforts in legal states), primarily funded by the Koch Brothers (RIP), who left behind a massive Memorial Justice (MJ) endowment.

Sadly, many of our war veterans still do not have access to medical marijuana, which even back in 2015 had been proven to treat PTSD, anxiety, depression, and insomnia. Since marijuana is still illegal at the federal level, veterans fear being drug-tested, losing their jobs, or having their children and pensions taken away in the event that a less-favorable administration increases enforcement.

ACTIVIST NETWORKS AND THE MOVEMENT
Like MLK, Rosa Parks, Gandhi, and Harvey Milk before them, new activists are launching a marijuana movement involving personal rights, legal justice, and public involvement. These “Green Raiders” include Sen. Alison Holcomb (a key player with the ACLU and Initiative 502); now-Senator Barbara Lee (D-CA); New York Stock Exchange President Troy Dayton (previously of the ArcView Group); “Fuckit I Quit” Governor Charlo Greene (AK); U.S. Cannabis Ambassador Rick Steves; and newly appointed Hemp Czar Vivian McPeak (previously of Seattle Hempfest). This green group of pot evangelists is leading the way on organic standards for the industry, living wages ($25 an hour), thriving community unions, carbon-neutral chronic, and, most important, citizen empowerment on a host of vital issues.

Overall, legalization in 2020—as a (still) relatively new public experiment—is going swimmingly. With 20/20 vision, it’s clear the end of prohibition is in sight.

 

This article first appeared in the Seattle Weekly