A Recent History
[ Marijuana Rx ] [ Alliance for Cannabis Therapeutics ]

 

Introduction
The Public Supports Medical Access
Inheriting Bad Policy
Synthetic Solutions
What Can Be Done?
Footnotes

 

MARIJUANA AS MEDICINE 

A Recent History (1976-1996) with Recommendations 

By Robert C. Randall & Alice M. O'Leary
Copyright © 1997 - Galen Press  All rights reserved 

The medical marijuana movement did not begin in 1996, nor did it begin in California.  In fact it began some twenty years before the passage of Proposition 215 in Washington, D.C..  The first laws recognizing marijuana's medicinal value were enacted in the unlikely states of: New Mexico, Florida, Louisiana, and Illinois.

This document provides an overview of the events which led up to the passage of Prop 215. It was originally prepared for the incoming Clinton Administration in 1993. Because of its length it has been divided into five separate documents plus a footnotes section. (See Contents below)

For a less academic overview of the medical marijuana issue checkout Marijuana Rx: The Patients' Fight for Medicinal Pot .

Contents

I. Introduction

II. The Medical Prohibition Has No Public Support
A comprehensive look at the broad-based support for controlled, medical access to marijuana

III. Inheriting Bad Policy 
The Clinton Administration inherited some bad policy decisions from President Bush. Unfortunately Clinton did nothing to reverse them. It was these decisions that set the stage for the ballot initiatives of 1996 and 1998.

IV. Synthetic Solutions
The federal government invariably claims that marijuana isn't needed by the seriously ill because Marinol, a synthetic version of marijuana's psychoactive ingredient, will do the job.

V. What Can be Done
A simple set of recommendations that could help resolve the medical marijuana problem

VI. Footnotes