Opinion ID: 3047693
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Raich’s Asserted Fundamental Interest

Text: Raich asserts that she has a fundamental right to “mak[e] life-shaping medical decisions that are necessary to preserve the integrity of her body, avoid intolerable physical pain, and preserve her life.” We note that Raich’s carefully crafted interest comprises several fundamental rights that have been recognized at least in part by the Supreme Court. See Law3048 RAICH v. GONZALES rence, 539 U.S. at 574 (recognizing that “the Constitution demands [respect] for the autonomy of the person in making [personal] choices”); Casey, 505 U.S. at 849 (noting importance of protecting “bodily integrity”); id. at 852 (observing that a woman’s “suffering is too intimate and personal” for government to compel such suffering by requiring woman to carry a pregnancy to term). Yet, Raich’s careful statement does not narrowly and accurately reflect the right that she seeks to vindicate. Conspicuously missing from Raich’s asserted fundamental right is its centerpiece: that she seeks the right to use marijuana to preserve bodily integrity, avoid pain, and preserve her life.12 As in Glucksberg, Flores, and Cruzan, the right must be carefully stated and narrowly identified before the ensuing analysis can proceed. Accordingly, we will add the centerpiece — the use of marijuana — to Raich’s proposed right.13 [13] Accordingly, the question becomes whether the liberty interest specially protected by the Due Process Clause embraces a right to make a life-shaping decision on a physician’s advice to use medical marijuana to preserve bodily integrity, avoid intolerable pain, and preserve life, when all other prescribed medications and remedies have failed. D. Whether the Asserted Right is “Deeply Rooted in This 12 This degree of specificity is required. In Cruzan v. Director, Mo. Dept. of Health, 497 U.S. 261 (1990), the Court declined to frame the right as an unqualified right to die, and instead specifically construed the right as a “constitutionally protected right to refuse lifesaving hydration and nutrition.” Id. at 279. 13 We also find persuasive the suggestion of amicus curiae California Medical Association and California Nurses Association: that the definition incorporate reference to the fact that Raich seeks to establish this right “on a physician’s advice.” We also think that resort to a Schedule I substance should be a last resort, and therefore narrow the right by limiting it to circumstances “when all other prescribed medications have failed.” RAICH v. GONZALES 3049 Nation’s History and Tradition” and “Implicit in the Concept of Ordered Liberty” We turn to whether the asserted right is “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” and “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,” such that “neither liberty nor justice would exist if they were sacrificed.” Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 720-21. [14] It is beyond dispute that marijuana has a long history of use — medically and otherwise — in this country. Marijuana was not regulated under federal law until Congress passed the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, Pub. L. No. 75-348, 50 Stat. 551 (repealed 1970), and marijuana was not prohibited under federal law until Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act in 1970. See Gonzales v. Raich, 125 S. Ct. at 2202. There is considerable evidence that efforts to regulate marijuana use in the early-twentieth century targeted recreational use, but permitted medical use. See Richard J. Bonnie & Charles H. Whitebread, The Forbidden Fruit and the Tree of Knowledge: An Inquiry into the Legal History of American Marijuana Prohibition, 56 Va. L. Rev. 971, 1010, 1027, 1167 (1970) (noting that all twenty-two states that had prohibited marijuana by the 1930s created exceptions for medical purposes). By 1965, although possession of marijuana was a crime in all fifty states, almost all states had created exceptions for “persons for whom the drug had been prescribed or to whom it had been given by an authorized medical person.” Leary v. United States, 395 U.S. 6, 16-17 (1969). [15] The history of medical marijuana use in this country took an about-face with the passage of the Controlled Substances Act in 1970. Congress placed marijuana on Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, taking it outside of the realm of all uses, including medical, under federal law. As the Supreme Court noted in Gonzales v. Raich, 125 S. Ct. at 2199, no state permitted medical marijuana usage until California’s Compassionate Use Act of 1996. Thus, from 1970 to 3050 RAICH v. GONZALES 1996, the possession or use of marijuana — medically or otherwise — was proscribed under state and federal law.14 Raich argues that the last ten years have been characterized by an emerging awareness of marijuana’s medical value. She contends that the rising number of states that have passed laws that permit medical use of marijuana or recognize its therapeutic value is additional evidence that the right is fundamental. Raich avers that the asserted right in this case should be protected on the “emerging awareness” model that the Supreme Court used in Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. at 571. The Lawrence Court noted that, when the Court had decided Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), “[twentyfour] States and the District of Columbia had sodomy laws.” Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 572. By the time a similar challenge to sodomy laws arose in Lawrence in 2004, only thirteen states had maintained their sodomy laws, and there was a noted “pattern of nonenforcement.” Id. at 573. The Court observed that “times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress.” Id. at 579. Though the Lawrence framework might certainly apply to the instant case, the use of medical marijuana has not obtained the degree of recognition today that private sexual conduct had obtained by 2004 in Lawrence. Since 1996, ten states other than California have passed laws decriminalizing in varying degrees the use, possession, manufacture, and distribution of marijuana for the seriously ill. See Alaska Stat. § 11.71.090; Colo. Rev. Stat. § 18-18-406.3; Haw. Rev. Stat. § 329-125; Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. tit. 22, § 2383-B; Mont. Code 14 The mere enactment of a law, state or federal, that prohibits certain behavior does not necessarily mean that the behavior is not deeply rooted in this country’s history and traditions. It is noteworthy, however, that over twenty-five years went by before any state enacted a law to protect the alleged right. RAICH v. GONZALES 3051 Ann. § 50-46-201; Nev. Rev. Stat. § 453A.200; Or. Rev. Stat. § 475.319; R.I. Gen. Laws § 21-28.6-4; Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 18, § 4474b; Wash. Rev. Code § 69.51A.040. Other states have passed resolutions recognizing that marijuana may have therapeutic value, and yet others have permitted limited use through closely monitored experimental treatment programs.15 [16] We agree with Raich that medical and conventional wisdom that recognizes the use of marijuana for medical purposes is gaining traction in the law as well. But that legal recognition has not yet reached the point where a conclusion can be drawn that the right to use medical marijuana is “fundamental” and “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty.” See Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 720-21 (citations omitted). For the time being, this issue remains in “the arena of public debate and legislative action.” Id. at 720; see also Gonzales v. Raich, 125 S. Ct. at 2215. [17] As stated above, Justice Anthony Kennedy told us that “times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress.” Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 579. For now, federal law is blind to the wisdom of a future day when the right to use medical marijuana to alleviate excruciating pain may be deemed fundamental. Although that day has not yet dawned, considering that during the last ten years eleven states have legalized the use of medical marijuana, that day may be upon us sooner than expected. Until that day arrives, federal law does not recognize a fundamental right to use medical mari15 While these lesser endorsements of medical marijuana are relevant, they cannot carry the same weight as legislative enactments that fully decriminalize the use of medical marijuana. As the Lawrence Court considered the number of states that retained laws that prohibited sodomy, so too must we consider the number of states that continue to prohibit medical marijuana. 3052 RAICH v. GONZALES juana prescribed by a licensed physician to alleviate excruciating pain and human suffering.16