Monday, Aug. 23, 2010

Frances Leal: Pot ban is discrimination

What is taking place here is our planet's greatest humanitarian movement -- medical cannabis for the sick and dying.

Denying people safe access once it is legal is a threat to our well-being and has become a safety issue. Therefore, all cities with bans are preventing good people from safe access to medical cannabis.

State law trumps city law. All cities will have to reform and enforce safe access for the sick and dying. Remember, a ban on something that is legal is a violation to Californians' civil rights everywhere.

Therefore, Purple Cross Rx in Los Banos is exercising its civil rights under the protection of the Constitution of the United States of America. Purple Cross Rx is in full operation under "The Compassionate Use Act of 1996" and is in full compliances with Proposition 215, Senate Bill 420, California state law.

It is true that we do not have a business permit due to the city of Los Banos turning us away three times. We intend to pay our taxes to the city of Los Banos regardless if the city wants it or not.

Purple Cross Rx is a compassion center for human relief. When the government acted to protect the civil liberties of Californians' right to medical marijuana, it acted with moral force. However, when cities prevent critically ill people from obtaining medical marijuana they are not acting with the same degree of moral virtue.

In September of 1937, marijuana became an illegal drug. Sixty years have gone by. In November of 1996, the right to medicate with marijuana became legal in California. The most useful crop known to man became a drug and our planet has been suffering ever since.

We are being discriminated against. I am a volunteer and a member of Purple Cross Rx.

Frances Leal

Los Banos