“If the vote were today” in Congress, says United States House of Representatives Member Thomas Massie (R-KY) in a new interview with host Matt Welch at Reason, “the federal prohibition [on marijuana] would go away.”
The catch, says Massie, is that leadership will not allow such a vote to occur. “A change in leadership could mean that issue gets resolved tomorrow,” asserts Massie.
No matter the current resistance by leadership, Massie predicts “the federal prohibition on the marijuana plant will be gone within a decade,” due to states taking the lead against prohibition rather than because of the bravery of legislators in Washington, DC.
Watch Massie’s complete interview here:
In the House of Representatives, Massie has supported ending the US government’s war on marijuana. A focus of that support has been Massie’s efforts to end US government prohibition on the growing of industrial hemp.
In the House, leadership has prevented marijuana prohibition roll back bills from reaching the floor for debates and votes. The House Rules Committee has also blocked many amendments seeking to chip away at marijuana prohibition from being considered on the House floor during debate of other legislation, such as appropriations bills.
Back in May of 2014, before consideration of marijuana prohibition roll back amendments was fully shut off in the House, House members voted by comfortable margins in favor of Department of Justice appropriations bill amendments intended to direct the US government to back off from taking action against people complying with state medical marijuana and industrial hemp laws that are less restrictive than the US government laws.
Massie’s assessment that there is now majority congressional support for taking the bigger step of ending the US government’s marijuana prohibition seems in line with growing majority public support for legalization as well as legalization having been approved in nine states and Washington, DC, with Michigan and New Jersey likely to be added to the list this year.
Massie is a member of the Ron Paul Institute Advisory Board.
