November 26, 2024
Editorial

ABUZZ AT THE BORDER

When Canada relaxed its drug laws last year to allow seriously ill people to use marijuana for pain relief, it did so under a court ruling that the existing prohibition was unconstitutional because it failed to recognize the drug’s medicinal properties. It also did so with the clear understanding the revision would antagonize the U.S. government, which continues its all-out war on drugs and views any relaxing anywhere as consorting with the enemy. And which openly and unabashedly threatened tighter border controls to pressure Ottawa into defying its own judiciary.

It also raised concerns that Canada would become the refuge of choice for fugitives from the south, as it was for Revolutionary-era British loyalists and Vietnam’s draft dodgers. Those concerns have been partially realized – three Californians are seeking asylum in British Columbia, claiming that extradition would result in their being persecuted in their homeland. Partial realization, however, is probably as far as this will get – no American has ever been granted asylum in Canada and it is unlikely these cannabis cases will be the breakthrough.

The reason this claim won’t fly is the difference between persecution for political beliefs – condemned under the Geneva Conventions – and prosecution for violating a law that applies to everyone. Being prosecuted for violating a law, no matter how hardheaded and ill-informed that law may be, is not cruel and unusual.

Canada’s new medical marijuana program is hardly a slippery slope that will lead to a nation of potheads. The rules are very strict: In a nation of 30 million, only 200 sick Canadians have qualified for the exemption; only the sick person or a designated caregiver can get a license to grow the plants; even people with the exemption have been prosecuted for growing more than their license allows.

There are lawsuits challenging those rules, particularly regarding the difficulties some terribly ill people have growing marijuana or getting someone to grow it for them. The changes these suits might produce will be modest and entirely in keeping with the sole objective of providing pain relief: a tightly regulated distribution system, probably; total legalization or substantially broader decriminalization, never.

The judges at the Ontario Court of Appeal did not succumb to the numbing argument heard here that marijuana cannot be approved for medical use because it has not been through clinical trials and it can’t have the trials because it’s illegal. Instead, the judges simply used their heads and their hearts to determine that any possible health risks pale in comparison to the agonizing pain of the terminally ill. If the U.S. government would develop a drug policy based upon something other than the ’50s cult film “Reefer Madness” and expressed in something other than the rhetoric of war, it could learn something from Canada. Instead, it threatens to clamp down at the border and fights on, ever more alone.


Have feedback? Want to know more? Send us ideas for follow-up stories.

comments for this post are closed

You may also like