The 117th Congress is set to expire on January 3, 2023. For all intents and purposes, Congress will be out of business for the remainder of the year by the second week in December. That means no more meaningful marijuana reform will take place in 2022. What about 2023, and the year after? What is the future of marijuana reform in the 118th Congress?
Trying to figure out what Washington lawmakers will do with marijuana over the course of the next two years is a fool’s errand. It is like trying to predict the weather. You may see some good news on the horizon only to have it dashed by some preemptive bad news. That is the way these things go.
According to a piece published by The Fresh Toast, the general consensus in Washington is that pushing marijuana reform any further in the next Congress is going to be an uphill battle. With the House now under Republican control, conservative lawmakers will have a greater voice – and likely a dissenting voice, too.
Piecemeal Legislation of Possibility
Some Republicans in Congress are on record as saying piecemeal legislation may be possible during the 118th Congress. Perhaps we’ll see a banking reform bill early in the session, then another bill to reschedule marijuana as a Class II or Class III drug. It is not reasonable to suspect that the next Congress will take up full legalization.
That will not stop lawmakers like Nancy Mase (R-SC) from pursuing legislation that would take marijuana regulation out of federal hands and place it with the states. Mace has been the chief sponsor of the States Reform Act in the House. She concedes that her bill probably won’t get any more action in 2022. But she and other reform supporters have plans in place for 2023.
The State Solution Appeals
It is Mace’s belief that the state solution appeals to more conservative lawmakers who are reticent about full decriminalization. In a perfect world, marijuana would be legalized across the board and the states given full authority to regulate it as they see fit. That is not likely to happen with the 118th Congress.
It is possible that Congress could pass legislation rescheduling marijuana. If that were the case, the same legislation could also give states the authority to regulate it. Doing so would end federal involvement in regulation and, in theory, also end federal marijuana prosecutions.
States Want the Authority
At this point, the state solution seems to be the smartest way to go. There are several reasons, beginning with the fact that the states want the authority to make their own decisions about recreational marijuana and medical cannabis. They get to make their own decisions about alcohol; they don’t see marijuana as any different.
In a state like Utah, where the people behind the Utahmarijuana.org website say medical cannabis laws are pretty strict, lawmakers want to keep their program medical-only. But in neighboring Colorado, lawmakers have thrown the doors wide open. They have given the okay to both recreational and medical consumption.
Taking Washington out of the equation even lines up with the original intentions of the founding fathers. If you look at the Constitution and other founding documents, you discover that a limited federal government was the original design. Our system was built specifically to give most of the power to the states.
Time will tell what the 118th Congress ultimately does with marijuana reform. The safe money says to not expect wholesale changes over the next two years. Any changes that do come are likely to be small and incremental.