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Divided Lawmakers Fight Over Easing Pot Penalties, Expanding Medical Access
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A push to ease restrictions on medical marijuana and reduce state punishments for possession of the substance are creating a sharp divide among Virginia lawmakers.
Legislators have already introduced 12 bills this session on the issue, ranging from proposals to decriminalize the substance to minor alterations of penalties. The decriminalization effort is already dead in the General Assembly, but there is mounting support for expanding access of marijuana extracts such as CBD oil for medicinal use. Current law only allows patients with intractable epilepsy access. Lawmakers are voting on a more targeted bill allowing cancer patients access to medical marijuana this week, reports WRIC.
Earlier in January, the state Senate approved a bill protecting people from prosecution who use marijuana extracts for conditions including cancer, glaucoma, human immunodeficiency virus, hepatitis C, Crohn’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis. The bill underwent an initial reading in the state House Tuesday and is likely to face opposition. The proposal stirred the protest of 11 senators of the 40-member body who voted against it Jan. 26.
“Pot was the biggest thing, and we had just simply had a collapse of good order and discipline,” Sen. Dick Black said at the hearing, referring to the U.S. after the Vietnam War. “I know where we’re headed; I can see a slippery slope. I do not want to see this country go back where it was in the ’60s and the ’70s because believe me it was not pretty. It was the worst of all times I have lived through.”
Proponents of the legislation note CBD oil and other cannabis extracts do not have psychoactive effects, meaning the user cannot use the extracts to get high. Parents of children with severe epilepsy, muscle spasms and rare medical conditions around the country report success with marijuana oils where all other approved medications failed.
“There has been some quibbling over the breadth of the list,” Republican Virginia state Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel, a co-sponsor of the bill, said at the hearing, according to WRIC. “But if you have someone in your family with a debilitating genetic disorder or is dying a painful death from one of these diseases, which one are you going to pick?”
Parents in many other states across the country face similar circumstances, committing felonies to ease their child’s suffering. Many state lawmakers remain opposed to medical marijuana legalization due to a lack of definitive research on the substance.
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