October 19, 2009 11:44AM 

# Good News on Medical Marijuana 

By [David Rittgers](https://www.cato.org/people/david-rittgers) 

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The Department of Justice is [changing](http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091019/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_medical_marijuana) its long-standing policy of ignoring state laws that allow marijuana use for medicinal purposes. This federalism question played out several years ago in the Supreme Court in the *[Raich](http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-1454.ZS.html)* case; Cato’s amicus brief is available [here](https://www.cato.org/pubs/legalbriefs/raich.pdf).

Cato hosted Rob Kampia of the Marijuana Policy Project in March, and you can view the event [here](https://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=5302). Glenn Greenwald wrote an influential [study](https://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10080) for Cato on the successful decriminalization of drugs in Portugal. Greenwald [notes](http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/10/19/drugs/index.html) that he gets more invitations to speak on the subject now than he did when it was published.

A good first step. Fourteen states permit medical marijuana dispensaries; I suspect more are on the way now that this hurdle has been cleared.

##### Related Tags 

[Constitutional Law](https://www.cato.org/constitutional-law), [Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies](https://www.cato.org/robert-levy-center-constitutional-studies) 

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