Except for those who sell or smoke "medical marijuana" in states where is it legal to do both, a decision by the U.S. Justice Department Monday probably went largely unnoticed.
The Justice Department told its prosecutors to stop targeting people who use or provide marijuana for medical purposes in the 14 states where doing so is legal. Those states are Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.
The supposedly conservative Bush administration, largely through the efforts of former Attorney General John Ashcroft, pursued prosecutions.
Current Attorney General Eric Holder said his department has better things to do. We agree.
That is not to say that we endorse legalizing marijuana. It's an open question and we can argue as forcefully for it as we can agin' it.
The issue is bigger than a joint or a roach clip.
For far too long in far too many areas at far too great a cost, the federal government has trampled the doctrine of states' rights.
The U.S. Constitution restricts the central government's role to, essentially, protecting against attack, conducting foreign affairs, and ensuring a free flow of commerce and enforcing our basic civil liberties.
Our reading of that document does not give the federal government license to regulate how long a tractor-trailer can idle at a truckstop; build rain forests in Iowa, bridges to nowhere in Alaska or a national groundhog weather museum in Punxsutawney; dictate how and to what standards our children are educated; set a nationwide legal limit for alcohol intoxication or require drug testing of students.
But Uncle Sam has done all of those things and more, along with running up a national debt that can never be paid off and trying to build nations out of mud pies in Afghanistan and Iraq, at a huge cost of blood and treasure.
The Obama administration has been labeled as "liberal," which is code for "wants to control your life and take away your freedom."
On Monday, the administration broke character. It actually did something "conservative," i.e., limiting "Big Brother" federal interference in what should be a state-decided issue. States license doctors and hospitals and regulate the practice of medicine. The Obama administration actually recognized this.
We can only hope it is a harbinger of things to come.
- Nick Hoffman