Despite this, every marijuana user in the U.S. is partaking in a controlled substance according to federal law. A new lawsuit, Greene v. Garland, seeks to change this discrepancy.
The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and Warren County, Pennsylvania, District Attorney Robert Greene filed the legal action against Attorney General Merrick Garland, leadership of the ATF and FBI as well as the U.S. government.
Greene, besides being DA, obtained a medical marijuana ID card in May of 2023 in accordance with Pennsylvania law. Since that point, however, he had to refrain from buying or possessing firearms or ammunition due to his choice of medications.
Among the attorneys representing the plaintiffs is SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. He noted the deluge of states legalizing medical marijuana despite the federal government’s lack of acknowledgment of the issue.
“With the increasing acceptance of medical cannabis, millions of Americans are forced to choose between the exercise of their Second Amendment rights or treating their symptoms with a substance that disenfranchises them from their constitutionally guaranteed right to keep and bear arms.”
Kraut noted that forcing this decision goes against the Constitution “and finds no basis in this country’s history and tradition. We look forward to vindicating the rights of medical marijuana users.”
SAF Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb agreed while observing that federal law contradicts the clear ruling in the landmark 2022 Bruen Supreme Court decision.
He declared that forcing the “automatic surrender” of Second Amendment freedoms “lacks any direct or analogous historical support.”
It is long past time for the federal government to reconsider its classification of marijuana as a Schedule 1 narcotic. This legal anachronism threatens to make felons of millions of otherwise law-abiding citizens, and their constitutional rights are needlessly revoked through this error.
