People around the country keep voting for marijuana. Here’s why that’s unlikely in NC.
On Election Day this year, people in several states voted for various forms of drug legalization — including deeply conservative Mississippi, where nearly 75% of voters approved of legalizing medical marijuana.
Exactly one week later, some state officials in North Carolina met to talk about decriminalizing or even legalizing marijuana here, too.
They discussed the economic and public health repercussions such a decision might have, as well as how drug laws disproportionately target minorities. The meeting was part of the Task Force for Racial Equity in Criminal Justice, which Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper established in response to the Black Lives Matter protests that began last spring.
Jim Woodall, the top prosecutor in Orange and Chatham counties, said he has already “more or less” decriminalized the possession of small amounts of marijuana in his two counties. His office typically doesn’t pursue marijuana charges unless it’s a felony amount, over 1.5 ounces, he said.
But he cautioned against hoping that the state legislature is going to get on board with expanding that philosophy statewide anytime soon.
“It’s nice to be aspirational, but you’ve got to be realistic at the same time,” Woodall said.
Even expanding Woodall’s policy statewide would be less extreme than what Mississippi residents just voted to do and join 35 other states with legal medical marijuana.
So some advocates might wonder why North Carolina can’t move forward with similar reforms.
One major factor is that many states, including Mississippi, allow something that North Carolina forbids: Residents can gather signatures for petitions on ballot initiatives. If an idea is popular enough, the people of the state can put it up for a vote even if politicians disagree.
And that’s exactly what happened last Tuesday in Mississippi, where 74% of voters supported legalizing medical marijuana despite the strong objections of their Republican governor, Tate Reeves.
Woodall said if the medical marijuana debate ever does come to North Carolina, he’d be skeptical about legalization. Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein, who co-chairs the task force, agreed.
“I like the decriminalization step first,” Stein said.
Unlike legalization, decriminalization would not allow marijuana dispensaries to open and begin selling pot. And people caught with small amounts would still get in trouble. But it would be handled more like a traffic ticket, with fines instead of criminal charges.
However, neither option is likely to happen in North Carolina while Republicans control the state legislature, because the state lacks of citizen-led ballot initiatives.
NC lawmakers decide what appears on the ballot
In addition to Mississippi, ballot initiatives are how two other Republican-led southern states, Florida and Arkansas, have also legalized medical marijuana over the last few years.
In North Carolina, the legislature alone can decide what will or won’t appear on the ballot. The two top Republican leaders at the legislature, Sen. Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore, did not respond to questions about whether they would consider any such proposals.
And while a 2019 study by the Pew Research Center found that two-thirds of Americans — including 55% of Republicans — think marijuana should be legal, recent history shows GOP politicians in North Carolina remain skeptical.
Last year the legislature nearly made hemp illegal because it looks like marijuana, even though hemp can’t get people high. And in last week’s election, Republicans picked up more seats in the General Assembly.
“When we look at what happened last Tuesday, especially down-ballot in North Carolina and all across the country, I think we’re just going to be spinning our tires,” Woodall said.
It’s not just Republican politicians who are wary of legalization, as Woodall and Stein indicated with their comments favoring decriminalization.
But Sen. Mujtaba Mohammed, a Charlotte Democrat, said that even under decriminalization the police would be able to target minorities for having marijuana, even if they couldn’t bring criminal charges.
A public defender, Mohammed said he would prefer legalization — but with the state strictly regulating marijuana sales, similar to the ABC system used to control liquor.
“I’m trying to see how do we reduce people of colors’ contact with law enforcement at the end of the day, which leads to horrible things happening,” he said.
Racial inequality in marijuana arrests
Although studies going back at least two decades show that Black and white people use marijuana at roughly the same rates, police and prosecutors are far more likely to charge minorities for having pot.
That includes North Carolina, where minorities make up less than one-third of the population but two-thirds of the nearly 40,000 criminal charges for marijuana possession in 2019.
“I don’t think any of us here are advocating for, ‘Let’s encourage people to smoke marijuana,’” said Democratic Rep. Marcia Morey, who represents Durham in the General Assembly, during the meeting Tuesday night. “But we’re looking at the racial inequities that are so tremendous.”
A former judge, Morey said she has seen the detrimental mental health effects marijuana can have on juveniles in particular.
She used her time Tuesday to focus more on what the justice system could do to help people who might still be having trouble getting a job or a lease because of a criminal record related to an old marijuana charge.
“We need to fix that and look at records and how to give second chances and expunge,” Morey said.
Some momentum for reform
In response to this summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, the legislature did pass two criminal justice reforms with broad bipartisan support.
One gave more leeway for people caught with small amounts of prescription pills to avoid lengthy “mandatory minimum” prison sentences. The other, called the Second Chance Act, made it easier for people to expunge criminal charges from their record as long as they have gone years without breaking the law again.
The main advocate for both bills was Republican Sen. Danny Britt, a criminal defense attorney from Lumberton. After they passed in June, Britt said there seemed to be an appetite for more criminal justice reforms in the future. And he framed the Second Chance Act, in particular, as being good not just for individuals but for jobs and the economy.
“This is a bill that keeps people in our communities able to contribute to their communities,” Britt said in June. “This is a bill that changes lives.”
Mohammed said that while he and other Democrats do see some common ground with Republicans on criminal justice reforms and improving racial equality, they also have to realize they aren’t going to get everything they want, since Republicans do still have the majority.
”We’re definitely going to have to move with baby steps,” he said.
For more North Carolina government and politics news, listen to the Domecast politics podcast from The News & Observer and the NC Insider. You can find it on Megaphone, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts.
This story was originally published November 12, 2020 at 2:09 PM.
