THE LEGAL STATUS OF CANNABIS

The medical use of cannabis is permitted in 36 states as well as the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Guam. At the federal level, cannabis is still classified as a Schedule I substance, making it illegal because of its alleged high potential for dependency with no accepted medical use. Under the 1970 Controlled Substances Act (CSA), distribution of cannabis is a federal offense, and federal law supersedes state law. In January 2018 the Trump administration reversed the previous administration’s policy of not prosecuting offenders who were in compliance with state laws. The Biden administration vowed to abandon those efforts and continue making progressive strides, and that should be much easier now thanks to the MORE Act, the first instance of federal legislation on the subject, which would decriminalize cannabis by removing it from the CSA’S list of scheduled substances. (It was passed by the House in December 2020 and is awaiting a vote in the Senate.)

PRESCRIPTION HERB In June 2018 the FDA approved the sale of cannabidiol (CBD) for the first time, specifically for the treatment of two rare forms of epilepsy that affect adults as well as children. The same drug in the form of CBD oil had been available as an unregulated supplement for a decade.