The U.S. Congress enacted the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) as part of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970. The CSA establishes that marijuana is a controlled substance and makes it unlawful to knowingly or intentionally manufacture, distribute, dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute, or dispense a controlled substance, including marijuana. The CSA was enacted pursuant to Congress’s authority under the Commerce Clause and includes findings that controlled substances have a substantial detrimental effect on the health and general welfare of Americans, that controlled substances manufactured and distributed intrastate cannot be differentiated from controlled substances manufactured and distributed interstate, and that federal control of the intrastate incidents of traffic in controlled substances is essential to the effective control of the interstate incidents of such traffic.
In 1996, California voters passed Proposition 215, codified as the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, to ensure that patients and their primary caregivers who obtain and use marijuana for medical purposes upon the recommendation of a physician are not subject to criminal prosecution. Angel McClary Raich and Diane Monson are California citizens who use marijuana as a medical treatment. Raich has been diagnosed with more than ten serious medical conditions, including an inoperable brain tumor, and Monson suffers from severe chronic back pain caused by a degenerative disease of the spine. In April 2002, deputies For Internet resources, please visit our website at www.cengage.com/blaw/bagley. From the Butte County Sheriff’s Department and agents from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) came to Monson’s home. The sheriff’s deputies concluded that Monson’s use of marijuana was legal under the Compassionate Use Act. Nonetheless, after a three-hour standoff involving the Butte County District Attorney and the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of California, the DEA agents seized and destroyed Monson’s six cannabis plants. Fearing raids in the future and the prospect of being deprived of medicinal marijuana, Raich and Monson filed suit against the U.S. Attorney General and the Administrator of the DEA, alleging that the CSA is unconstitutional. Is the CSA unconstitutional? Explain why or why not.
[Gonzales v. Raich, 545 U.S. 1 (2005).]