Maine news, sports, weather | Kennebec Journal, Augusta, Maine

MAINE COMPASS: Governor, Legislature have gutted citizens’ initiative on marijuana

Maines Constitution affirms the right to the citizens' initiative, which embodies the right to self-govern.

In November, 59 percent of Maine voters approved Question 5, the citizens initiated Maine Medical Marijuana Law. The intent of the people's law was to increase access for people who suffer from certain defined debilitating conditions to their chosen treatment: marijuana.

The people's law did not trespass upon anyone's individual rights, nor did it take away from municipalities the right to decide what kinds of businesses they want in their towns.

The law ensured the rights of the people regardless of personal perspectives on marijuana use.

The governor-initiated bill, now LD 1811, An Act to Amend the Maine Medical Marijuana Law, the passage of it by the Legislature and the rules put in place by the Department of Health and Human Services has nullified the people's law.

LD 1811 and its associated rules contradict the original intent of the people's law, making illegal what patients had been doing legally for more than a decade under the old Maine Medical Marijuana Law.

 • It trespasses upon the individual right to be secure in one's home through the required consent that subjects the patient to unwarranted search and seizure.

 • It trespasses upon the individual right to be secure in one's papers through the required medical release that a patient must sign giving the DHHS, a regulatory agency, access to private health histories.

• It requires the patients to pay $100 yearly to the DHHS to consent to forfeiture of their rights under the Fourth, Fifth and Ninth amendments.

The aversion to this kind of trespass upon individual security will force many to either continue what they were doing and now be illegal or submit. This does not expand access; it puts barriers in the way of access and contradicts the original intent of the people's law.

The patient chooses either to grow the marijuana themselves or to designate a caregiver to grow for them. The amended law places caregivers and dispensaries at odds, causing a tenuous situation for the patient who should be secure in their access.

The unequal restrictions on the plant itself between patients and caregivers and the dispensaries reduces the ability to maintain a consistent supply of medical marijuana  both for the patients who choose to grow themselves and for the patients who choose a private grower/caregiver to be their provider.

This will force a patient to either go to the black market or go to a dispensary. This does not increase access to the medicine; it limits access and reduces choice for the patients.

The people's law was founded on the right of the patient. The amended law is founded on the right of the government over the rights of the patient. The amended law exploits the vulnerability of the patient.

The media have focused on the dispensaries and the municipalities responses to them and have ignored the fact that the law in operation is not the law the people passed.

Through LD1811 and its associated rules, the state has trespassed all over our constitutional right to self-govern through the citizens' initiative. If these actions are left to stand, this circumvention of the people's law will be used for precedence in the future.

Cynthia Rosen, of Washington, is a mother, wife and farmer. She also is a registered voter who has deep convictions regarding the principle of by the consent of the governed.