Marijuana Might Be Legal in Canada by July

The Toronto Star reported “an Ontario Superior Court judge has ruled that the federal medical marijuana program is unconstitutional, giving the government three months to fix the problem before pot is effectively legalized.”

Canadians have been fighting for marijuana reform since 1973, when the LeDain Commission called for an end to the criminalization of citizens who possess and cultivate marijuana. At the time, the medicinal effects of marijuana were being recorded and the criminality of marijuana possession was becoming scrutinized by the public and lawmakers alike.

To rational human beings, the idea a teenager would be branded a criminal for life for possessing a small amount of marijuana seems ludicrous. In Canada, this is one of the primary reasons for marijuana reform. (In the United States, harsh drug laws were designed to incarcerate generations of low-income and ethnic offenders, becoming the bedrock of it's prison culture.)

Canadian lawmakers have danced around the issue since 2001, when the legal regulation of medical marijuana use was introduced. However, many doctors believe there is no scientific evidence that marijuana has any medicinal effects whatsoever. Furthermore, Canadian doctors are uncomfortable with their role as “gatekeepers” to marijuana therapy. This is fair, as it is a societal, legal and cultural issue—not a medical one.

The creation of medical marijuana laws has cost the government its ability to criminalize marijuana use. If the Canadian government doesn’t appeal the court’s decision within three months pot will not only be decriminalized in Canada (such as getting a parking ticket) it will be legalized.

The ruling comes from a case where a 37-year-old man suffering from fibromyalgia, scoliosis and seizures took to growing his own pot because it was too complicated and time-consuming to work with doctors.