Editorial:

Brian Taylor Editor

Will we finally change these archaic and ineffective Canadian marijuana laws, or will attention again be diverted from marijuana by a new war? Will the Commons listen to the Senate report, or will the house be swayed by Stephan Harper, who would rather his children drink alcohol.

I was one of those long-hairs from the 70’s that left the activist community, got a job, had kids and was surprised when I woke up at the carnage and damage that prohibition has caused over the last 30 years.

In this issue we applaud the so often maligned legal profession, which has mounted multiple legal challenges and has placed the law makers on notice. I sense from all but a few in the cannabis community a sigh of relief that the battle is won, the war is over. True, more people are looking at addictions as health problems, but the darker days are behind (the ones our grandchildren will see as barbaric) and we are beginning to treat addicts with more dignity and yes, maybe marijuana will be legal to grow at home.

Decriminalization or legalization will bring new challenges, old problems will remain and counter-moves by zealous prohibitionists will happen. Pressure from the U.S. could still derail or severely delay any progress.
Let us not make the same mistake we made in the 70’s, we owe it to our children to remain diligent.
I was pleased to receive permission from the only Canadian cannabis medical access group to print their petition and the response from Health Canada. Seeing Health Canada’s blatant disregard for the highest court in the land and the frightening bureaucratic logic in turning down the involvement of the patients in the process in hard copy is priceless!

Unfortunately, the attitude that underlies this action by Health Canada is the same ethic that will never allow them to forgive those of us who have broken the rules. Although we would all benefit if Health Canada would utilize the existing network of clubs and organizations, like the fallen sinners in a western epic, Health Canada will not include or consult with pot-smoking patients, compassion clubs, cannabis magazines or marijuana activist organizations of any kind.

In the next edition of CH we will address the economics of cannabis, what prohibition is costing, what decriminalization could do to local economies, and what new cannabis opportunities could return to investors with vision.

In preparing for the coming issue on economics, I was struck by the crushing poverty of so many chronically ill Canadians. I met medical users that choose pot over food, because, “Hey man, who wants to eat, when you are sick and in pain?”

James Wakeford, an early soldier in the battle for access to cannabis has been bankrupted by legal cost, police harassment and other cost (see page 11). With medical plans getting more restrictive and drug costs going up patients are using proceeds from excess marijuana that they sell to friends to support the increasing cost of their traditional prescription drugs.
Put that in your health care budget.
Brian Taylor

L e t t e r s
So I am now legal!
Today the courier came with my new exemption paperwork and my picture ID card, so I am now “legal” until January 22, 2004. I also now have a designated grower for the first time and am hoping the terrible financial burden will ease off, once the crop comes in.

I’d like to thank everyone who wrote me with their support and encouragement, I truly needed that!
Please keep fighting for our right to determine our own medical treatment. Seems to me it is the “informed consent” with our doctor that is the issue. Every patient who has surgery, for example, signs an ‘Informed Consent’ form, stating that they know there are risks, they’ve talked it over with their doctor, and they are aware there could be adverse consequences or side effects to their procedure. If Health Canada would change that one criteria for medicinal pot, just think of the millions we tax payers could save and redirect towards actual health care instead of bureaucracy. It took five phone calls with my specialist, after my Nov 1st. appointment, to get the forms completed to Health Canada’s standards. No wonder the doctors are reluctant to get involved. Anyway, just my thoughts.
Yours in good health,
Lindy

No “tomatoes” for you!
After reading this article (Welcome to the tomato game, page 8, Issue #2 of CH) I can only wonder in amazement at what the people at the Hydroponic Expo were smoking? At every Hydroponic store I visit I announce that I am growing medical marijuana and that I am a legal grower with an exemption from Health Canada and promptly ask if they give discounts to med users.

Most shops will give a discount if you show them your exemption or a membership card to a local compassion club, depending on how much you spend. What I have found is that the owners of those stores are quite happy to have a legal grower as a customer, because it allows them to be more open about the... ahem... “tomato growing equipment”.

Those companies that are upset by people talking shop (marijuana) won’t see any of my hard cash (and they miss out on free samples at harvest time).
Michael ‘Mik” Mann

Cannabis in time
1893-94: British Indian Hemp Drugs Commission Report.

1914: El Paso Texas bans Marijuana.

1923: Marijuana was first banned in Canada under the Opium and Drug Act.

1937: (prior) At least 27 medicines containing marijuana were legally available in the U.S.. Many were made by well-known pharmaceutical firms that still exist today, such as Squibb (now Bristol-Myers Squibb) and Eli Lilly. The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 federally prohibited marijuana. Dr. William C. Woodward of the American Medical Association opposed the Act, testifying that prohibition would ultimately prevent the medicinal uses of marijuana.

1944: Mayor La Guardia’s report on The Marihuana Problem in The City of New York.

1954: New laws were passed in which a person could be charged for possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking, with a maximum sentence of seven years imprisonment. The sentence was doubled the following year to 14 years.

1961: The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. The act increased the minimum penalty for cultivation to 7 years, and the minimum for importation and exportation to 14 years. This made the marijuana laws carry the second heaviest minimum sentence in Canadian criminal law, surpassed only by that imposed for capital and non-capital murder.

1967: The UK urges legalization of cannabis. The Beatles sign it. 3,000 people hold a ‘smoke-in’ in Hyde Park. Keith Richards and Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones are arrested and imprisoned for cannabis. This prompts a Times editorial ‘Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?’. The convictions are quashed on appeal. In the UK 2,393 persons are arrested for cannabis offences. In the USA over 3,000 joints get mailed to addresses at random by Abbie Hoffman and the Yippies.

1970: Le Dain Report (Canada) recommended that serious consideration be given to the legalization of personal possession of marijuana. It finds that cannabis use increases self-confidence, feelings of creativity and sensual awareness, facilitates concentration and self-acceptance, reduces tension, hostility and aggression and may produce psychological but not physical dependence. The report recommends that possession laws be repealed. This report cost Canada 4 Million Dollars and was completely ignored by the government.

1983: The USA government (Reagan/Bush) orders american universities to destroy all 1966-76 research work on cannabis.

1988: In the USA - a clear violation of rights to free speech - laws were passed prohibiting the right to explain how drugs are produced, advocate use of drugs or hemp, and even promoting legalization of drugs was outlawed. The penalties were $100,000 for the first offence and $300,000 for the second, with six months to a year’s incarceration.

1992 (April): NORML Canada (National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws) was charged with distribution of pro-legalization pamphlets of marijuana, but charges were dropped two months later.
Cannabis in time

1992: U.S. President Clinton admits he smoked cannabis, but did not inhale. Howard Marks admits that he smoked cannabis, but never exhaled.

1994 (Oct.): NORML filed a complaint with regards to suppression of free speech, and the Ontario Court of Justice agreed with the complaint. The prohibition of literature was overturned.

1997: Marijuana covered by the new Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

1997: (Jan.): A court in Texas, USA, sentences medical marijuana user William J. Foster to 93 years imprisonment for cultivation of one plant.

1998: Italy decriminalizes possession of drugs and permits small-scale cultivation of cannabis for own use.

1998 (June): The UK Government has granted a license to grow and possess cannabis for the purposes of medical trials, to Dr Geoffrey Guy of GW Pharmaceuticals. The crop, grown at a secret location in southeast England, is guarded by electrified razor-wire fences, security cameras and guard dogs.

1999 (March): The National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine (IOM) concluded “there are some limited circumstances in which we recommend smoking marijuana for medical uses.”

1999 (April): Switzerland legalizing Cannabis.

1999 (June): The Canadian Federal government has given permission for the cultivation and use of marijuana for medical purposes.

2000: The Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs announces that over 30,000 Canadians were charged with simple possession of marijuana.
2000 (Jan.): In Ottawa Health Canada has given Robert Brown the OK to smoke marijuana after the victim of hepatitis C spent two days camping in the rain on Parliament Hill protesting for the right to do so.

2000 (May): Over 90% of Canadians support decriminalizing marijuana for medicinal purposes, according to a National Post poll.

2000 (July): The judgment in R. vs Parker declares the prohibition on the possession of marijuana in the Act “to be of no force and effect”, but suspends that declaration for a year to give Parliament time to amend the federal legislation to comply with the Charter.

2000 (Oct.): UK reports that cannabis is less harmful than Aspirin.

2001 (Jan.): Canada firm grows medical pot in mine shaft. Federal government is paying Prairie Plant Systems almost $6 million to grow marijuan.a

2001 (July): Canadian Federal government regulations on the possession and production of medical marijuana for personal use went into effect. They are an attempt to provide some relief to those suffering from debilitating diseases and those who are terminally ill.

2002 (May): As the Flin Flon experiment proves to be a flop, federal officials have no one to blame but themselves. The people at Prairie Plant Systems have NO experience in growing cannabis.
Cannabis in time

2002 (May): 9 Canadians in Kitchener, Ont., who are allowed to smoke marijuana for medical reasons plan to launch a civil lawsuit this week against the federal government in an effort to ease access to pot.

2002 (July): B.C. Provincial Court Judge Higinbotham granted an absolute discharge to Philippe Lucas, Director of the Vancouver Island Compassion Society from charges stemming from his involvement with the VICS. This precedent-setting case opens the doors to fully recognized legal medical marijuana distribution for compassion clubs across Canada.

2002 (Sept.): The Special Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs reviewes Canada’s current anti-drug policies and legislation and says that marijuana is not a gateway drug and should be treated more like tobacco or alcohol rather than like harder drugs.

2002 (Nov.): Steve & Michele Kubby – At the request of Crown Counsel Don Fairweather, all charges against the Kubbys were dropped and Judge Dan Noon also ordered the return of all growing equipment and medicine.

2002 (Dec.): A 13-year-old boy from Constable Neil Bruce Middle School died by suicide after being suspended from school for smoking marijuana. Six weeks later, 15-year-old Jason Ricciuti, a promising minor hockey goalie who attended Rutland senior secondary, also took his own life during a road trip to the Lower Mainland, after being caught smoking marijuana.

2002 (Dec.): The House of Commons Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs looked at an overall drug strategy for Canada and issued their report. The committee said that while marijuana is unhealthy, the current criminal penalties for possession and use of small amounts of cannabis are disproportionately harsh. They recommended that the Canadian Ministers of Justice and of Health come up with a strategy to decriminalize the possession and cultivation of not more than 30 g (about an ounce) of cannabis for personal use.

2002 (Dec.): The charges against Marc St-Maurice and Alexandre Neron, two members of the Compassion Club, have been thrown out. The Compassion Club says it aims to provide marijuana for medicinal purposes. The idea is to make pot available to AIDS sufferers and those with chronic illnesses.
Cannabis in time

2002 (Dec.): Quebec court Judge Gilles Cadieux says Canada’s marijuana laws unfairly infringe upon the constitutional rights of patient with serious medical conditions. Cadieux says he doesn’t have the authority to declare the laws unconstitutional. As a result, he has dismissed charges of possession and trafficking in marijuana.

2003 (Jan.): In Ontario, a judge threw out a charge against a teenager after ruling that there effectively exists no prohibition against the possession of marijuana. Justice Douglas Phillips noted that in July 2000 the Ontario Court of Appeal found invalid prohibitions against possession of marijuana contained in the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

2003 (Jan.): A newly released document shows that Cindy Cripps-Prawak has been fighting a proposed policy shift that would deliver government-certified marijuana to chronically ill Canadians. Currently, Health Canada will provide its standardized marijuana only to accredited researchers, who would then dispense it to select patients in clinical trials. Patients not enrolled in such trials can seek federal authorization to possess marijuana to alleviate symptoms - but they have to get the stuff on their own from the street. They can also grow it from seeds or have someone else do it for them.

2003 (Jan.): An eastern Ontario man has won his court battle to toke and drive in what could become a precedent-setting case. Rick Reimer, a former lawyer and marijuana activist who had a joint in his hand when police pulled his car off the road, was acquitted yesterday of driving while impaired by marijuana.

2003 (Jan.): Supreme Court Judge Linda Loo ordered police to return Brian Carlisle’s 51 marijuana plants and all other items seized in a raid in Hope in July 2001. She further ordered the second monetary part of Carlisle’s damages for $90,000.

2003 (Jan.): Justice John Moore threw out marijuana possession charges against Martin Barnes - ruling that there is no law prohibiting the possession of small amounts of marijuana.

2003 (Jan.): “Canada rules, that’s for sure,” Warren Hitzig, an applicant in the constitutional challenge, said. “The judge said it’s unconstitutional for medical users to use the unconventional measures they had to use,” said Hitzig, a founder of the Toronto Compassion Centre, which sold medicinal pot to about 1,500 terminally ill people until it was raided last year. “We’re very gratified by the decision,” lawyer Joseph Neuberger (one of four lawyers who successfully argued before Justice Sidney Lederman) said. “It addresses the concerns that we highlighted and puts real pressure on the government to now put into place a regime that does provide them with access to and (a) safe supply of medicinal marijuana. If they don’t comply, then possession is lawful and they’re no longer subject to criminal law.”

2003 (Jan.): - Pot possession law challenged in Summerside Court - Further cases to be adjourned until judge makes ruling. The validity of the law that prohibits the simple possession of marijuana has been challenged in a P.E.I. Provincial Court.

2003 (Jan.): - TORONTO - The federal Justice Department will prosecute two employees of the Toronto Compassion Centre, despite a recent court ruling that such clubs may be a good way to distribute marijuana to people with medical exemptions. A preliminary hearing for Warren Hitzig and Zack Naftolin was set for July 14, after a brief court appearance in Toronto. Hitzig and Naftolin both face six trafficking-related charges because of their involvement in the centre, which provided medical marijuana for five years before a police raid last summer.

Sources:
http://www.cannabisnews.com/
http://www.mpp.org/index.html
http://www.johnconroy.com/
http://civilliberty.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mpp.org%2Fmedicine.html
http://www.ccguide.org.uk/chronol.html

Canadas Cannabis Lawyers
Canada’s marijuana laws have been changing in favour of the popular will of Canadians and through the tireless efforts of a few determined lawyers. Cannabis Health hopes to highlight some of the changes and the people who are making them.

John Conroy - QC

We are all hoping that early in the spring of 2003, John W. Conroy Q.C., along with fellow lawyers Prof. Alan Young and Paul Burstein, not to mention David Malmo-Levine on his own behalf, and supporting ‘Interveners’ from the Canadian and British Columbian Civil Liberties Associations, will enter, once again, through the massive doors of the Supreme Court of Canada to argue that the prohibition of the possession and use, including distribution, of cannabis (marijuana),under the Federal Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, is for various reasons, unconstitutional. On December 13th, 2002, despite the objections of all counsel, including counsel for the Crown, the Supreme Court Justices felt compelled to adjourn all three appeals to the spring term, to await the outcome of the promise by the Liberal government (arising from Justice Minister Cauchon’s comments in the media) to introduce some form of decriminalization in Canada, through Parliament in the first four months of this new year.

In a letter dated January 13th, 2003 to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, copied to the Registrar of the Court, Mr. Conroy, on behalf of all the appellants, urges the Minister to act quickly, reviews what transpired in the previous month leading up to the adjournment, and re-iterates the submission that similar promises or statements (to change Canadian marijuana laws) have been made by politicians or government representatives in various years in the past from Mr. Trudeau in 1970, Joe Clark in 1979, Jean Chretien in 1980 and 1996, and Keith Martin in 1997 and 2001, to name a few, and yet the law remains essentially the same as it did in the ‘sixties’ when it comes to cannabis prohibition. John Conroy is not cynical when he says this, he has simply been doing this long enough to have seen and heard these many broken promises from our politicians, that he no longer gives them much credibility.

John’s pilgrimage to the Supreme Court of Canada began in 1993, soon after Randy Caine was arrested, and is the first challenge of the marijuana laws under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the first to get leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. He will submit on behalf of the appellants that the current laws pertaining to personal possession and use of marijuana is a violation of the constitutional right to liberty and to the security of one’s person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice. It is an attempt to establish the John Stuart Mill ‘harm principle’ as a principle of fundamental justice in Canada and to thereby limit the federal government’s criminal law power over benign conduct.

The Conroy and Company website says a lot about what motivates John. In essence this firm is interested in protecting individuals from the abuse of power by governments at all levels and to ensure that those exercising statutory power do so fairly and within their jurisdiction. Behind his kindly, conservative appearance beats the heart of an activist. Founding member and first Canadian president of NORML Canada, John has selflessly given many hours of his own time helping those large and small caught up in the cannabis and other legal webs.
The cannabis issue is far from the only battleground for John, who belongs to many organizations including Penal Reform International and the International Society for the Reform of the Criminal Law. John chaired a Committee of the Canadian Bar Association (the Committee on Imprisonment and Release) for some 15 years and in that capacity appeared frequently before various Senate and Parliamentary Committee’s on criminal and correctional law issues, including anything put forward by the government on ‘drugs and drug laws’. He has established numerous legal precedents in prison law and other areas. He became involved with the Legal Aid in law school and continued this when he moved back out to the Fraser Valley in the spring of 1973. He ran the first ‘Community Law Office’ in the Province in Abbotsford from 1975 until 1980 and, because the demands on his time from prisoners and their families was such from the surrounding prisons, that he created ‘Prisoners Legal Services’ and ran it from 1980 until 1985 before slowly moving back to private practice, usually because of funding cutbacks. He authored ‘Canadian Prison Law’ in 1980. This book is in the process of being updated and put on the web (see www.canadianprisonlaw.com). He was appointed Queen’s Counsel (made a Q.C.) in 1996. John and a few other lawyers were put up for this honour several years earlier when Bill Vander Zalm was Premier and turned down because of their positions against him and his government. As John says – being turned down by Vander Zalm must have meant we were doing something right – in some ways an even greater accolade.

Born in Montreal, his formative younger days were spent on the continent of Africa, growing up in exotic places like the then Belgian Congo (later Zaire and now the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)), Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Nyasaland (now Malawi), and, to some extent, in Europe (his mother is Belgian, having met John’s father at the end of WWII during the liberation of Belgium). His father was born in Montreal, but of Irish parents and consequently John also enjoys Irish citizenship. His father obtained a Degree in Agriculture from McGill after the war and, after a brief period in the Ontario tobacco fields, took the family over to Africa and worked for the ‘colonial service’ as a consultant on the growing of tobacco for the Nyasaland government. John recalls how the Africans used marijuana regularly without apparent problem to his youthful eye. His father would simply uproot a plant if he saw one amongst the tobacco fields or elsewhere. John remembers growing his own tobacco plants with the help of his father when he was about 10 years old.

John went to boarding school under the Jesuits at St.George’s College in then Salisbury (now Harare). At age 16, after completing Form IV under the British school system, John returned to Canada in January 1964 to Vancouver (where the weather promised to be the closest to what he had become accustomed) and completed grade 13 at Abbotsford Senior Secondary. He met the love of his life, Sharie, at Fort Camp student residence at UBC in 1965, obtained a degree in Physical Education (BPE - 1968), while Sharie obtained her Degree in Education (B.Ed). They married in 1969 in New Westminster. John received a Bachelors of laws (LLB) from UBC in 1971.He was called to the Bar in 1972, and after a couple of years downtown, they moved to the ‘farm’ at Mission. John chose to practice law in Abbotsford, and put down some roots in the countryside. His two daughters, Lisa (now 24 and following in her grandfather’s footsteps in Plant Sciences at Guelph) and Ginny (21 and working as John’s computer technician while continuing her studies in that field ).

“I would never have been able to accomplish many of the things I have without the support of my family and particularly Sharie. In fact I couldn’t function without her”, says John. She has stood by him through thick and thin, supporting him, encouraging him, keeping his spirits up and just plain looking after him for now 34 years, while at the same time raising two wonderful daughters and running the farm, feeding them organic vegetables - not to mention getting involved in her own causes and issues.

In the minds of many, John is the reason that West Coast Cannabis activism - both medical and recreational - has been so successful. He may not attend every rally (although he does catch his fair share), but he’s around and available for every pot bust, and is involved in nearly every significant trial. Notables such as Hilary Black, Marc Emery and Philippe Lucas praise both the lawyer and the man, saying “Myself and so many others are free to do what we need to do to make a difference, because we’re safe in the knowledge that if it all goes to hell, we won’t be alone in court. In a movement full of brave and heroic troublemakers, John is our defender; he is a hero to the cannabis movement, and I’m happy and honoured to call him a friend.”

Alan Young

When Young takes on a marijuana case, you can almost feel the prosecution cringe. Widely reputed as Canada’s foremost cannabis lawyer, Young is an early film-school enthusiast, outstanding civil rights lawyer, professor of law at Osgoode Hall, Co-Director of the Innocence Project, author of full-length works for the theatre, and his first published short story appeared in the Christmas 1999, issue of Taddle Creek. He’s a new age male, closet Simpsons fan, and is committed to justice and personal freedom.

His home is situated in the picturesque student apartment area of downtown Toronto, just a few blocks from the university. It is his sanctuary, decorated with wall hangings and Tibetan art, low tables as altars, and it reveals Young as a pragmatist but also a seeker of social and spiritual transformation.

In recent years, Alan has been involved, directly or indirectly, in most of Canada’s landmark marijuana cases. He is one of those rare lawyers who concerns himself more with morality than cash reward. “Anyone who knows me, knows that all you have to do is cry to get free legal work.” Young, who works for victims rights and violence against women and children, states, “I am pretty redneck when it comes to crimes of violence.” Far from prudishness, the outspoken Young believes that the pursuit of pleasure, be it cannabis, sex or gambling, should be legislated and not prohibited. “What intrigued me originally was our society’s interest in prohibiting pleasure-seeking activities on the basis that vice leads to uncontrollable decadent behaviour. My goal as a lawyer is to reverse this trend of over-criminalization, to allow people to construct their own heaven and hell. The conservative mentality has always been that the fall of great civilizations is the result of pleasure-seeking activity, and that the Roman Empire itself imploded because Romans were pleasuring themselves to death. The reality is, the Roman Empire fell apart because of various tribes attacking it, and there has never been, in my opinion, a society that fell apart as a result of pleasure-seeking activity.”

In 1990 Alan was instrumental in challenging Canada’s obscenity laws, as he refers to in his interview (below) about “the revolution of the 90’s”. In 1997, Young challenged parliament’s authority to create laws against harmless activities like smoking or growing pot when he defended Chris Clay, the owner of a hemp and bong store in London, Ontario. Clay had been charged with cultivation and possession after growing clones in the front window of his shop. The judge upheld the law, but established a precedent by finding that marijuana use was indeed relatively harmless. Young went from the Clay case to the Jim Wakeford case in 1998. As a result , the courts forced Parliament to create the Section 56 exemption program in 1999.

Young provided the background materials for the Terry Parker case, which was handled expertly by his colleague, lawyer Aaron Harnett. Parker, a med-pot user who lives with epilepsy, needed med-pot to control his seizures. The Parker case forced the government to revise the med-pot regulations within one year, or cannabis laws would be declared null and void. In July 2001, the government responded by implementing the new Marijuana Medical Access Regulations. In a case that Young describes as his “third kick at the can in 2002”, Young and a cadre of lawyers represented several clients: Leora Shemesh will represent Catherine Devries, Jari Dvorak and Mary-Lynne Chamney. A partner in the law firm where Shemesh works, Joseph Neuberger will represent Deborah Anne Stultz-Giffin and Stephen Van De Kemp; lawyer Paul Burstein will represent Marco Renda, and Alan Young will represent Warren Hitzig. The resulting decision by justice Lederman has given the government another 6 months to make cannabis available to eligible Canadians.

In early April Young will be sharing the Supreme Court arena with his close friend and fellow pugilist John Conroy. He and the team has a litigation strategy and will be considering the impact of the commons’ decision or their failure to act. In a “companion” action, the team will represent the trilogy of Randy Caine, Chris Clay and David Malmo Lavine (representing himself).

Cannabis Health interviews Alan Young:
CH: I understand you have a new book you are working on?

AY: It could be a little early to release information on that at the moment. I could tell you that it is called “Justice Defiled”. It’s vicious, it’s satirical and hopefully it will shake the foundations of the legal profession.

CH: Tell us about your early involvement with Marc Emery.

AY: Oddly enough, the way in which Marc, who had been coined “Prince of Pot”, got into pot, resulted in us loosing a constitutional challenge to the obscenity provision in 1990. Marc discovered that in 1980 parliament had passed a provision relating to drug literature, prohibiting it - which is how he got his free speech bug. So, he sold grow books outside the police station and they wouldn’t arrest him. To make a long story short, that gave him his interest in pot, after a visit to Southeast Asia. Eventually, in 1995, we managed to strike down the provision, which resulted in the proliferation of magazines, grow books and, really, the renaissance in cannabis culture. This became what I consider to be a minor revolution in the culture in the past 5 years that may or may not reflect a political change.

To illustrate, there is a new Simpsons show, where there is a small 3 second clip, where Otto the bus driver is smoking a joint. Something that would be an abhorrent image even 10 years ago.

CH: Are we looking at a similar scenario to the 70’s, where we get distracted from the issue by another war?

AY: Part of the problem with people in the movement is that we are constantly preaching to the converted and that we forget how ‘multiplex’ the issue is. Ultimately it will have to do with issues relating to money, and the “American Question” than the proper principle moral approach to it.

CH: Where are we going now?

AY: I still remain somewhat pessimistic about the ability of our judges to follow us because of feared implications that it has, or about the political power of government in choosing what to criminalize or not. It is not a simple issue of whether or not we supply these 800 patients, but whether we get into the business of distribution, or do we let the marijuana possession die?

CH: So, do you think they will just let the clock run out on it?

AY: Well, basically they have 6 months to make their decision.

CH: And if they don’t act?

AY: They will have to appeal. I feel that I have boxed them into a corner, because I have hit them where they are most vulnerable, which is money and expenditure.

CH: How has this affected your personal life?

AY: I think this is sad, but, in terms of students - and this reflects the demographics - it makes me one of the coolest professors. So, it is not a negative perception. I do much which is beyond the marijuana subject, so in some ways it is all consistent.

David Malmo Lavine

I began smoking pot in 1985. I was 14 years old. For me, it was an anti-stress, anti-depression, anti-fatigue, anti-insomnia, pro-appetite or “preventative” medicine and a time-slowing inspiring or “performance enhancing” medicine. Although I didn’t really see it as self-medicating at first, that’s exactly what I was doing - those were the effects cannabis consistently had and continue to have on me.

According to a 1997 Angus Reid poll, 83% of Canadians approve of cannabis when used for health reasons. Stress, depression, fatigue, loss of appetite and lack of sleep are conditions commonly treated by both pills and cannabis. Recreation, as the worldwide Webster dictionary points out, means “to restore to health”. One might argue that 83% of Canadians approve of cannabis when used for healthful recreation by healthy users in the context of preventative medicine.

In 1990, I visited Holland to see first-hand the fabled “coffee shops” - places where cannabis and hashish and mushroom sales are tolerated. As I floated around Amsterdam, searching in vain for the mayhem and social decay that prohibitionists guaranteed would result from an open cannabis market, it dawned on me: Canadians were very much like the Dutch - tolerant, freedom-loving, productive and autonomous. I remember thinking to myself “If the Dutch can handle this much freedom, why can’t we?”

My regular cannabis use did not interfere with being gainfully employed. While living in Edmonton, I worked for two years as a drug-store clerk, delivering synthetic medicine to the home-bound while selling tobacco, coffee, pop and sugar to the unstimulated and chocolate to the lonely. I worked at Tim Hortons - again selling coffee, pop, chocolate and sugar. I worked a stint as a hospital security guard, making sure the alcoholics didn’t run off for a drink as they took their bi-hourly smoke-breaks. I even worked two months as a “Recreational Therapist” at the Edmonton Young Offenders Centre. Mislabled “corrections”, it is at best “warehousing” - or, more realistically, “crime school” - for poor and aboriginal youth. In 1993, I joined with dozens of activists across the country, using flagrant violations of the law to teach hemp history and call attention to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act - then known as ‘Bill C-7’ - which had been designed to adjust Canadian cannabis law to allow for mass arrests. In 1995, my skills came to the attention of Marc Emery and others, and I was flown out from

Edmonton to Vancouver to work as a professional cannabis re-legalization activist.
On October 19, 1996, I co-founded the “Harm Reduction Club”, a direct-action cannabis re-legalization organization that demonstrated how simple it was to distribute “recreational” cannabis properly. Our club featured a pledge not to drive impaired and requested members read a “Safer, Smarter Smoking Guide”as conditions of membership. I sold the herb out of my basement apartment - all the neighbours immediately signed up.

On Dec. 4th, 1996, police raided the Harm Reduction Club at gunpoint and seized 316 g of bud. I was charged with possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking. By that time the club had grown to about 700 members.

Cst. S. Dion was tendered by the crown as an expert on cannabis trafficking. He confirmed that, to some extent, the Club offered methods to reduce the harm from any marijuana use, and that the Club was a consumer-oriented venture, following a well-established cultural tradition allowing the use of marijuana. Further, testimony from the applicant’s mother, father and apartment manager demonstrated neighbourhood, community and multi- generation support for the Club. Finally, it is very important to note that the Club’s membership card specified that members pledged not to drive while “impaired”, not merely while “under the influence”. The distinction was made to address valid community concerns while avoiding possible discriminatory practices - like the harassment of non-impaired drivers who happen to be “high” on cannabis.

In my trial, I introduced terms familiar to some drug counsellors and young pot activists but unfamiliar to police, doctors, crown prosecutors and most, but not all researchers. For example, “harm reduction” means “education, quality control and a safe point of sale”. “Education” means teaching about the hazards of prohibition but also about proper dosages and other “smarter smoking” methods. Smarter smoking means focusing on the following factors: dose, mind-set, setting, strain, quality, potency, smoke-cooling, clean ignition and clean mode-of-administration. We taught users how to look for signs of chemical fertilizers & pesticides or mold or other contaminants that may cause respiratory illness.

After reading the arguments made by John Conroy in the Caine case, I went on to represent myself at the B.C. Court of Appeal. Since then, I have studied cannabis history and law, organic farming and comparitive fertilizer radioactivity from the leading experts in these areas.

I helped then-mayor of Grand Forks Brian Taylor in his bid for a grow contract with Health Canada for the Canadian Medical Marijuana Clinical Trials. I spoke to the Senate. I ran in the last provincial and federal elections. I organize an average of 3 public protests per year and I have published 18 issues of my magazine Potshot, which I have since put on the Internet. I’ve written numerous articles for Cannabis Culture magazine, and I have been working, for the past two years, at Pot TV, a free internet video service. My show is called “High Society”- I urge everyone to examine the websites www.potshotzine.com, www.cannabisculture.com, www.pot-tv.net.

Jim Wakeford

Jim Wakeford is fighting for the right to grow marijuana for therapeutic uses and he won’t give up until he’s won. Diagnosed with HIV in 1989 and living with full blown AIDS since 1993, Jim knows his days are numbered. Jim lives on the Sunshine Coast and spends much of h