The Senate nixed a last-ditch effort Thursday night to have Vermont voters weigh in this coming November on whether they support legalization of marijuana.
With the legislature braced to adjourn for the year on Saturday, that defeat likely means lawmakers will leave without any marijuana legalization — or even a commission to study it.
“Fuck the commission,” a frustrated Senate Judiciary Committee chair Dick Sears (D-Bennington) said after his effort to create a public advisory vote failed. “The commission was unnecessary.”
A couple of hours earlier, Sears had been willing to go along with creating a marijuana legalization study commission if lawmakers also agreed to the public advisory vote.
But he came to that option only after the House soundly defeated the Senate’s marijuana legalization bill Tuesday in a 121-28 vote.
“I think the advisory vote is an opportunity to educate the public,” Sears said. “It might give some in the other body information they need to either vote against it or support it.”
A public advisory vote has not been used in Vermont since a 1976 ballot measure asked whether the state should start a lottery. Seven times in the 1800s and early 1900s, the state used the device to seek public input on temperance. The law in Vermont lacks a mechanism for binding referendums like those that Colorado, Washington and Oregon used to legalize marijuana. Sears said it would have been clear the question was non-binding.
Sears had proposed asking on the November ballot: “Should the State of Vermont legalize personal possession and cultivation of small amounts of marijuana and regulate and tax marijuana for adult use?”
Sears quickly learned the ballot item was controversial.
Sen. Becca Balint (D-Windham) made an impassioned plea to fellow Democrats not to use the ballot box to decide social issues. As a gay person with family members who were killed in the Holocaust, she said, “I can’t tell you how terrified I am when it comes to referendums. We don’t have control over what the questions are going to look like in future.”
House Speaker Shap Smith (D-Morristown) said his members were also having a hard time with the idea. After House Democrats suggested inserting legislation calling for a public advisory vote in the budget bill, Smith said, “We were having a lot of members coming and telling us, ‘If you put it in the budget, we will not vote for the budget.’”
Sen. Dustin Degree (R-Franklin) had other questions about the use of an advisory vote.
“Are there campaign laws set up to deal with this?” he asked on the Senate floor.
“It’s not a campaign,” responded Senate Government Operations Committee chair Jeanette White (D-Windham).
“In theory, there could be millions and millions and millions of dollars spent,” Degree said.
“I really don’t want to see a million dollars spent,” Sen. Anthony Pollina (P/D-Washington) told Senate Democrats. “I already know how people feel.”
Sears said Thursday night he likely had run out of time to try other options related to marijuana legalization. “You win some, you lose some,” he said.
This post was updated at 9:40 p.m. on May 5, 2016.
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Dick Sears gutting of the original S241 was the reason why the cannabis legalization movement failed in VT. The original S241 would have created revenue for many Vermonters and every single town would have reaped the benefits. The bill that Tricky Dick Sears replaced it with was a corporate takeover of cannabis which would have put the vast revenue into the hands of a few instead of the people of Vermont. We should thank the House for rejecting Sears241. We should criticize the House for failing to even be able to decriminalize minor cannabis offenses. A complete failure of our government all around. I hope people take notice and vote many of these clowns out. (We do however have a lot of good politicians, contact your local reps, find out what they have to say)
We’d all be better off if the police would focus on crimes that have actual victims.
Does anyone, other than those who pad their pockets from prohibition honestly believe that wasting $20 Billion and arresting 3/4 Million Americans annually for choosing a substance scientifically proven to be safer than what the govt allows, is a sound policy?
…does Balint not understand the term ‘non-binding’? It’s time to start voting out the deadwood.
“those we elected to do their jobs”?
We elected them to do the right thing even if a majority of their constituents want them to do otherwise – which is exactly what they did in this case. Thanks, legislators, for collectively doing your job.
Good.
There was no upside if it did well (we already know that Vermonters support legalization when asked in a statistically valid poll). There was only downside if it did poorly due to the non-random nature of voter turnout.