Category: reason

Today the Supreme Court decided Facebook v. Duguid. This case presents a question of statutory interpretation. Section 227(a)(1) of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) provides this definition of an autodialer:

equipment which has the capacity–

(A) to store or produce telephone numbers to be called, using a random or sequential number generator; and

(B) to dial such numbers.

Justice Sotomayor wrote the majority opinion for the Court. She framed the issue this way:

Facebook argues the clause “using a random or sequential number generator” modifies both verbs that precede it(“store” and “produce”), while Duguid contends it modifies only the closest one (“produce”). We conclude that the clause modifies both, specifying how the equipment must either “store” or “produce” telephone numbers. Because Facebook’s notification system neither stores nor produces numbers “using a random or sequential number generator,” it is not an autodialer.

Justice Sotomayor begins by citing Justice Scalia’s book with Bryan Garner. She discusses the series-qualifier canon:

Congress defined an autodialer in terms of what it must do (“store or produce telephonenumbers to be called”) and how it must do it (“using a random or sequential number generator”). The definition uses a familiar structure: a list of verbs followed by a modifying clause. Under conventional rules of grammar, “[w]hen there is a straightforward, parallel construction that involves all nouns or verbs in a series,” a modifier at the end of the list “normally applies to the entire series.” A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 147 (2012) (Scalia & Garner) (quotation modified).The Court often applies this interpretative rule, usually referred to as the “series-qualifier canon.” 

And the Court applies the “series-qualifier” canon to the Section 227(a)(1) of the TCPA:

Here, the series-qualifier canon recommends qualifying both antecedent verbs, “store” and “produce,” with the phrase “using a random or sequential number generator.” That recommendation produces the most natural construction, as confirmed by other aspects of §227(a)(1)(A)’s text.

Justice Alito only concurred in judgment. He agreed with the Court’s reading of the statute. But he poked Justice Sotomayor about the serial-qualifier canon:

I write separately to address the Court’s heavy reliance on one of the canons of interpretation that have come to play a prominent role in our statutory interpretation cases. Cataloged in a treatise written by our former colleague Antonin Scalia and Bryan A. Garner, counsel for respondents in this case, these canons are useful tools, but it is important to keep their limitations in mind. This may be especially true with respect to the particular canon at issue here, the “series-qualifier” canon.

Justice Alito notes that the use of this canon is limited. Indeed, he favorably cites Will Baude and Steve Sachs, who were skeptical of the “series-qualifier” canon:

As set out in Reading Law 147, this canon also applies when the modifier precedes the series of verbs or nouns. Some scholars have claimed that “nobody proposed [the series-qualifier] canon until Justice Scalia pioneered it” in Reading Law. Baude & Sachs, The Law of Interpretation, 130 Harv. L. Rev. 1079, 1125 (2017)

Justice Alito casts some doubt about whether Facebook’s reliance on the series-qualifier canon “generally reflects the most natural reading of a sentence.” Instead, Justice Alito would temper this canon with the “common understanding” of a phrase. This argument resemble Justice Alito’s approach to textualism in Bostock.

Next, Justice Alito urges corpus linguistics scholars to investigate the “strength and validity” of canons:

The strength and validity of an interpretive canon is an empirical question, and perhaps someday it will be possible to evaluate these canons by conducting what is called a corpus linguistics analysis, that is, an analysis of how particular combinations of words are used in a vast database of English prose. See generally Lee & Mouritsen, Judging Ordinary Meaning, 127 Yale L. J. 788 (2018). If the series-qualifier canon were analyzed in this way, I suspect we would find that series qualifiers sometimes modify all the nouns or verbs in a list and sometimes modify just the last noun or verb. It would be interesting to see if the percentage of sentences in the first category is high enough to justify the canon. But no matter how the sentences with the relevant structure broke down, it would be surprising if “the sense of the matter” did not readily reveal the meaning in the great majority of cases.

I hope scholars take up Justice Alito’s assignment. And they can even use “homework-help websites” like COFEA!

Finally, Justice Alito casts some doubt on this, and other canons:

To the extent that interpretive canons accurately describe how the English language is generally used, they are useful tools. But they are not inflexible rules. Appellate judges spend virtually every working hour speaking, listening to, reading, or writing English prose. Statutes are written in English prose, and interpretation is not a technical exercise to be carried out by mechanically applying a set of arcane rules. Canons of interpretation can help in figuring out the meaning of troublesome statutory language, but if they are treated like rigid rules, they can lead us astray. When this Court describes canons as rules or quotes canons while omitting their caveats and limitations, we only encourage the lower courts to relegate statutory interpretation to a series of if-then computations. No reasonable reader interprets texts that way.

I suspect this case suffered from the Bostock hangover.

Justice Sotomayor responds to Justice Alito in a footnote:

Linguistic canons are tools of statutory interpretation whose usefulness depends on the particular statutory text and context at issue. That may be all JUSTICE ALITO seeks to prove with his discussion and list of “sentences that clearly go against the canon,” post, at 3. (That the grammatical structure of every example he provides is materially dissimilar from that of the clause at issue in this case proves the point.) But to the extent that he suggests that such canons have no role to play in statutory interpretation, or that resolving difficult interpretive questions is a simple matter of applying the “common understanding” of those “familiar with the English language,” post, at 2–3, we disagree. Difficult ambiguities in statutory text will inevitably arise, despite the best efforts of legislators writing in “English prose,” post, at 4. Courts should approach these interpretive problems methodically, using traditional tools of statutory interpretation, in order to confirm their assumptions about the “common understanding” of words.

I’m surprised that Justices Thomas joined this footnote.

One final note. Bryan Garner argued this case. He lost, unanimously. And the Court rejected Garner’s argument based on the “rule of the last antecedent” and the “distributive canon.” Yet, the Court and the concurrence cited Garner’s writings with Justice Scalia to support the opposite side. Paul Clement, a former Scalia clerk, notched another unanimous victory.

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Today the Court decided FCC v. Prometheus Radio Project unanimously. This case upheld the Commission’s decision to repeal or modify media ownership rules. Specifically, the Court found that the agency action was not arbitrary and capricious. Justice Kavanaugh wrote the majority opinion. In Part II, he described the Court’s APA jurisprudence in a novel fashion:

The APA’s arbitrary-and-capricious standard requires that agency action be reasonable and reasonably explained. Judicial review under that standard is deferential, and a court may not substitute its own policy judgment for that of the agency. A court simply ensures that the agency has acted within a zone of reasonableness and, in particular, has reasonably considered the relevant issues and reasonably explained the decision. See FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U. S. 502, 513–514 (2009); Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Assn. of United States, Inc. v. State Farm Mut. Automobile Ins. Co., 463 U. S. 29, 43 (1983); see also FCC v. WNCN Listeners Guild, 450 U. S. 582, 596 (1981).

“Zone of reasonableness.” Sounds like “zone of interests.”  At first blush, I couldn’t quite place it. FCC v. Fox and State Farm did not use that phrase. Where have I heard that expression before? The answer is Justice Kavanaugh’s concurrence from DHS v. Regents. Kavanaugh’s analysis from Prometheus is copied, almost verbatim, from his Regents concurrence. Last June, he wrote:

The APA’s arbitrary-and-capricious standard requires that agency action be reasonable and reasonably explained. As the Court has long stated, judicial review under that standard is deferential to the agency. The Court may not substitute its policy judgment for that of the agency. The Court simply ensures that the agency has acted within a broad zone of reasonableness and, in particular, has reasonably considered the relevant issues and reasonably explained the decision. See FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U.S. 502, 129 S.Ct. 1800, 173 L.Ed.2d 738 (2009); Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Assn. of United States, Inc. v. State Farm Mut. Automobile Ins. Co., 463 U.S. 29, 103 S.Ct. 2856, 77 L.Ed.2d 443 (1983).

There is only one substantive difference. The concurrence refers to a “broad zone of reasonableness.” And Prometheus refers to a “zone of reasonableness,” presumably not broad. Here, Justice Kavanaugh has quietly rephrased the Court’s approach to A&C review. The Court had never adopted this test before. But now lower courts will have to determine what the “zone of reasonableness” is.

I always read Kavanaugh’s opinions very carefully and check his citations. He doesn’t always show his work. Justice Kavanaugh resembles the Chief Justice in this regard. Here, Justice Kavanaugh had an idea in a 2020 concurrence, and buried it in a 2021 majority opinion without acknowledging its provenance. I don’t know if the “zone of reasonableness” will have much of an impact on admin law. But the Court should recognize this change.

I don’t know if this move represents a retreat from the Chief’s stringent A&C review in Regents. This language seems quite deferential:

In short, the FCC’s analysis was reasonable and reasonably explained for purposes of the APA’s deferential arbitrary-and-capricious standard. The FCC considered the record evidence on competition, localism, viewpoint diversity, and minority and female ownership, and reasonably concluded that the three ownership rules no longer serve the public interest. The FCC reasoned that the historical justifications for those ownership rules no longer apply in today’s media market, and that permitting efficient combinations among radio stations, television stations, and newspapers would benefit consumers. The Commission further explained that its best estimate, based on the sparse record evidence, was that repealing or modifying the three rules at issue here was not likely to harm minority and female ownership. The APA requires no more.

To be sure, in assessing the effects on minority and female ownership, the FCC did not have perfect empirical or statistical data. Far from it. But that is not unusual in day-to-day agency decisionmaking within the Executive Branch. The APA imposes no general obligation on agencies to conduct or commission their own empirical or statistical studies. Cf. Fox Television, 556 U. S., at 518–520; Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 435 U. S. 519, 524 (1978). And nothing in the Telecommunications Act (or any other statute) requires the FCC to conduct its own empirical or statistical studies before exercising its discretion under Section 202(h). Here, the FCC repeatedly asked commenters to submit empirical or statistical studies on the relationship between the ownership rules and minority and female ownership. See, e.g., In re 2014 Quadrennial Review, 29 FCC Rcd., at 4460, and n. 595. Despite those requests, no commenter produced such evidence indicating that changing the rules was likely to harm minority and female ownership. In the absence of additional data from commenters, the FCC made a reasonable predictive judgment based on the evidence it had. See State Farm, 463 U. S., at 52.

And Justice Kavanaugh closes with a rehash of the “zone of reasonableness” language:

In light of the sparse record on minority and female ownership and the FCC’s findings with respect to competition, localism, and viewpoint diversity, we cannot say that the agency’s decision to repeal or modify the ownership rules fell outside the zone of reasonableness for purposes of the APA.

For those interested, the phrase “zone of reasonableness” often comes up in the interpretation of ambiguous contracts. I did some more digging. The Court denied cert in Scenic America v. Department of Transportation (2017). Justice Gorsuch wrote a statement respecting the denial of certiorari, which was joined by the Chief Justice and Justice Alito. In that statement, Justice Gorsuch seemed to cast some doubt on this “zone of reasonableness” test. He wrote:

But in relatively recent times some courts have sought to displace familiar rules like these in favor of a new one, suggesting that an administrative agency’s interpretation of an ambiguous contractual term should always prevail—at least so long as the agency’s interpretation falls within a (generously defined) zone of “reasonableness.”
Of course, courts sometimes defer to an agency’s interpretations of statutory law under Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 866, 104 S.Ct. 2778, 81 L.Ed.2d 694 (1984), and its progeny. But whatever one thinks of that practice in statutory interpretation cases, it seems quite another thing to suggest that the doctrine (or something like it) should displace the traditional rules of contract interpretation too.

Justice Thomas also wrote a concurrence in Prometheus. He wrote that the “FCC had no obligation to consider minority and female ownership.” The majority declined to reach this issue.

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The facts, from Commonwealth v. Mason, decided last week by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court:

Eric Valle … hired Appellee to act as a nanny for his children and, in doing so, prohibited her from using corporal punishment on the children. Approximately one month after Appellee commenced working for Valle, Valle’s three-year-old son reported that Appellee was “thumbing” him in the face and hitting his twin two-year-old sisters. Around that same time, Valle observed that one of the twins had a “busted lip” and that his son occasionally had marks on his face.

Valle asked Appellee about his daughter’s injured lip, and Appellee initially could not offer an explanation. The following day, however, she suggested that the child may have injured herself while attempting to climb out of her playpen. Valle was skeptical of this possibility given that his daughter suffered no other injuries that would indicate that she fell from her playpen. Of further note, Appellee told Valle that she did not know why his son would claim that she was “thumbing” his face or that she was striking the twins.

Additionally, after Appellee began to care for the children, Valle noticed a shift in their behavior. For example, if Valle raised his voice, his daughter would cover her face, a behavior that she did not exhibit prior to Appellee’s employment with the family. Indeed, it appeared to Valle that his children were afraid of Appellee.

Approximately two months after Valle’s son reported these incidents to him and Valle confronted Appellee, Valle placed a camera in his children’s bedroom. The camera captured sound and video of its surroundings. Valle purposely did not inform Appellee of the presence of the camera. At some point, the camera recorded Appellee yelling at one child before forcefully placing her into a crib located inside of the bedroom where the camera was recording. Audio portions of the recording also suggest that Appellee may have struck the child several times. Valle gave the recording to the police.

The Commonwealth subsequently charged Appellee with aggravated assault, simple assault, and endangering the welfare of children. In response to Appellee’s habeas corpus motion, the trial court dismissed the aggravated assault charge due to a lack of sufficient evidence to support it. Appellee then filed an omnibus pretrial motion, which included a motion to suppress the audio and video recordings captured by the previously mentioned camera….

The trial court granted the suppression motion, and the appellate court agreed as to the audio portion, but the Pennsylvania Supreme Court reversed. The Pennsylvania Wiretap Act, which is at the heart of the case,

1. makes it a felony to “intercept … any wire, electronic or oral communication,” and makes such illegally intercepted communications generally inadmissible.
2. “Oral communication” is in turn limited to “[a]ny oral communication uttered by a person possessing an expectation that such communication is not subject to interception under circumstances justifying such expectation.”
3. “Intercept” is defined to cover any “acquisition of the contents of any wire, electronic or oral communication through the use of any electronic, mechanical or other device.”
4. And the Act has an exception (which the court didn’t interpret here) for “[a]ny victim, witness or [licensed] private detective … to intercept the contents of any wire, electronic or oral communication, if that person is under a reasonable suspicion that the intercepted party is committing, about to commit or has committed a crime of violence and there is reason to believe that evidence of the crime of violence may be obtained from the interception.”

Chief Justice Max Baer’s majority (joined by Justices Thomas Saylor, Debra Todd, Kevin Dougherty, and Sallie Updyke Mundy) concluded that the interception prohibition didn’t apply:

[A]bsent demonstrable circumstances to the contrary, we believe it is objectively reasonable to conclude that persons in Appellee’s position do not have a justifiable expectation that their oral communications will not be subject to interception while they are in a child’s bedroom. Notably, the use of recording devices in homes as a means for parents to monitor people hired to care for their children have become so commonplace that these devices are often referred to as “nanny cams.” That is to say that the expectation that a childcare worker is going to be recorded in their employer’s home is so ubiquitous in our society that we have a name for it.

Justice David Wecht dissented; his dissent largely focused on statutory construction and on whether an earlier precedent should be overturned, but it also disagreed with the majority’s application of the “justifiable expectation” test:

The Majority’s entire analysis hinges on the correctness of a single proposition: that the use of recording devices to monitor child care workers is “ubiquitous.” The implication, of course, is that nannying is an occupation in which constant surveillance is the norm, to be expected by any reasonable caregiver. The Majority offers no support for this assertion, which strikes me as quite dubious. My own instinct—admittedly no more scientific than the Majority’s—is that most parents are reluctant to place their children (and homes) in the custody of people they do not trust….

Most people in most situations generally assume (correctly) that they are not being recorded. Thus, as before, “I have no trouble concluding that this expectation [of non-interception] is justifiable in the vast majority of instances in which people speak, and becomes unjustifiable only in the presence of some indicia that one’s utterances are being intercepted.”

Justice Christine Donohue dissented as well:

I strongly disagree that, as a matter of law, anyone accepting employment as a nanny forfeits his or her right of privacy in the child’s bedroom. The Majority does not explain why a nanny must assume that she will be surreptitiously spied upon by her employer after being entrusted with the care of that employer’s children, or why the nanny should not assume instead that a parent who placed him or her in this position of responsibility also trusted that appropriate care would be given to the children. There is nothing in the record to support the notion that an expectation of distrust by parents is “ubiquitous” in our society, that all parents surveil their child’s caregiver, or even that most babysitters (of varying ages) are aware of the general utilization of such surveillance devices. But even if one assumes broad awareness of the existence of nanny cams, knowledge of the device’s capabilities (e.g., whether they are activated by motion detectors, whether they capture both video and audio, etc.) is certainly not universal….

In my view, privacy principles require that to validate evidence from the use of surveillance devices in criminal proceedings, a parent utilizing such a device to monitor a nanny must advise the nanny that it has been installed, where it is located, and that it is recording his or her words and actions. Given appropriate notice, issues relating to the nanny’s privacy rights and the admissibility of evidence under the Wiretap Act would be avoided. Candor about the surveillance may serve to prevent unwanted behavior if a parent believes that trust may have been misplaced when employing the nanny. It also allows the nanny to decide whether he or she is willing to give up privacy expectations because of his or her occupation in the home of another.

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Do you actually need to be a state-licensed surveyor in order to use drone technology to map out private property? A collision between drone-driven entrepreneurial innovation and occupational license gatekeeping in North Carolina has led to a lawsuit.

Michael Jones launched a drone photography business in Goldsboro, North Carolina, in 2016, taking aerial photos of private property (on behalf of the property owners) and using tech tools to put the images together as maps. According to the Institute for Justice, which is representing him, Jones’ business—360 Virtual Drone Services—did not represent or market itself as engaging in “land surveying.” The maps he created were not designed to be used to establish legal property boundaries.

These were maps developed for property owners’ and developers’ purposes, like determining ways to alter the land and to evaluate the state of their property. Jones is simply using drone technology to collate images of property and present them in topographical maps and 3D visualizations.

This has run Jones afoul of North Carolina’s Board of Examiners for Engineers and Surveyors, which oversees the licensing of professionals in these fields. In 2018, the board sent Jones a letter telling him he was being investigated for possibly engaging in surveying without a license. Then, in 2019, he was sent a cease-and-desist letter telling him to stop his mapping work. If he did not, he faced the possibility of civil and even criminal charges for engaging in surveying work without a license. He could be fined up to $1,000 and get sent to jail for up to 60 days.

The board is claiming that essentially any form of map making that Jones is doing with his drone counts as “surveying,” even if he’s not creating them to be used for legal purposes. And so, in order to “legally” take pictures and combine them into maps with his drone, Jones needs to acquire the appropriate degrees, pass examinations, and get licensed.

Under such a threat, Jones stopped using his drone to make maps and got legal representation. On March 22, the Institute for Justice filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, arguing that the Board’s licensing program violates Jones’ First Amendment rights.

“The problem is when you define surveying as simply collecting and disseminating data about land, you’re getting into First Amendment territory,” Institute for Justice Attorney Sam Gedge tells Reason. “Basically, you don’t need the government’s permission to create information and sell that information to willing people. Communicating information is speech, and it’s protected by the First Amendment.”

At the heart of the conflict is the surveying industry disruption being caused by the development of cheaper drone technology. Gedge noted that, historically, when the owner of a large tract of property (like a mall or farm) needed visuals and maps, this required expensive technology and likely the rental of a plane for a flyover. Jones was offering a cheaper alternative, sending a drone hovering overhead, taking dozens of photos that could be automatically stitched together (without requiring years of professional training).

“Now that commercial drones are relatively affordable, you’re seeing people able to offer services that were the sole preserve of licensed professionals,” Gedge says. And some of those professionals aren’t going to take that lying down. The Institute for Justice lawsuit notes that Jones is not the only drone operator to have received threats from the Board. At least six other drone companies have received similar cease-and-desist letters accusing them of engaging in surveying without a license.

Jones’ lawsuit is asking the court to determine that these licensing demands violate the First Amendment. The suit also seeks an injunction stopping the Board from enforcing any bans on “taking aerial photographs and for collecting, processing, disseminating, and selling images of and information about land and property (including distances, coordinates, elevations, and volumes).”

The Institute for Justice also produced a useful explainer video:

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Yesterday, on the same day that New York became the 16th state to legalize recreational marijuana, legislators in Santa Fe approved a bill that will add New Mexico to that list. The Cannabis Regulation Act passed the state House by a vote of 22–15 and the state Senate by a vote of 38–32 during a special session convened by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who is expected to sign the bill soon.

New Mexico is the fourth state, in addition to New York, Illinois, and Vermont, to legalize marijuana through the legislature. Thirteen other states have approved legalization by ballot initiative, although South Dakota’s measure is tied up in the courts.

The New Mexico bill allows adults 21 or older to purchase and possess in public up to two ounces of marijuana, 16 grams of cannabis extract, and “eight hundred milligrams of edible cannabis” (by which it presumably means edibles containing up to 800 milligrams of THC). Residents also can legally transfer those amounts to other adults “without financial consideration.” The bill imposes no limits on possession at home.

Marijuana use will be allowed in licensed “cannabis consumption areas.” The bill refers specifically to “smoking cannabis,” which suggests that other kinds of consumption will be allowed elsewhere.

Adults will be allowed to grow up to six mature and six immature cannabis plants at home. Unlike New York’s law, which delays permission for homegrown marijuana until up to 18 months after the first state-licensed retailer opens (which may not happen until late next year), New Mexico’s bill allows home cultivation while the state creates a system for licensing and regulating commercial production and distribution.

The bill assigns that task to a newly created Cannabis Control Division of the New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department. The division is required to write rules for licensing and regulating recreational marijuana businesses by January 1. That is also the deadline for beginning to process license applications. The division is required to begin allowing retail sales by April 1, 2022.

The retail sale of cannabis products will be taxed at a rate of 12 percent—substantially lower than the THC and sales taxes New York plans to collect. A third of the revenue is earmarked for local governments.

A fiscal impact report from the Legislative Finance Committee notes that “there is no effective date of this bill,” so “it is assumed that the effective date is 90 days following adjournment of the Legislature.” That implies decriminalization of possession and home cultivation will take effect in June.

Another bill approved by New Mexico legislators yesterday, which Lujan Grisham also is expected to sign, requires automatic expungement of government records related to marijuana offenses that are no longer crimes. Marijuana offenders who have not completed their sentences will be eligible for judicial dismissal and expungement. The bill says expunged records may not be considered in decisions regarding public employment or professional licenses.

Virginia legislators, meanwhile, are gradually moving ahead with plans to legalize marijuana for recreational use. Gov. Ralph Northam yesterday said he would like the state legislature to legalize simple possession by July 1, “nearly three years sooner than previously planned.” He also thinks home cultivation of up to four plants should be allowed by that date. But the deadline for the legislature to enact provisions regarding commercial production and distribution is still January 1, 2024, which means retail sales won’t begin anytime soon.

“Virginia will become the 16th state to legalize marijuana,” Northam said yesterday. That prediction already has been overtaken by events. Virginia might instead be the 18th state to legalize marijuana (or the 17th, if you don’t count South Dakota). That’s assuming no other state acts in the meantime.

“New Mexico joins an ever-growing list of states that have realized the failures of marijuana prohibition and the harms it brings to their communities and citizens,” says Erik Altieri, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. “They are the third state so far this year that has approved legalization via the legislative process [counting New Jersey, where the legislature approved a plan in response to a 2020 ballot initiative], and we expect several more will follow suit in a short period of time. The American people are demanding an end to prohibitionist policies that have wreaked havoc on communities of color, squandered countless millions in taxpayer dollars, and wasted limited judicial and law enforcement resources on criminalizing otherwise law-abiding individuals for possession of a product that is objectively less harmful than currently legal alcohol and tobacco.”

All of the conduct decriminalized by these state laws, including possession, cultivation, and sales, is still prohibited by the federal Controlled Substances Act. The Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement (MORE) Act, which was approved by the House of Representatives in December but was never considered by the Senate, would have addressed that untenable situation by removing marijuana from the schedules of controlled substances. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D–N.Y.) plans to reintroduce the MORE Act, and yesterday Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D–N.Y.) said his chamber will soon consider legislation that would “end the federal prohibition on marijuana.”

President Joe Biden, notwithstanding his avowed conversion from draconian drug warrior to enlightened reformer, has shown no inclination to do that. Altieri hopes the continuing collapse of marijuana prohibition at the state level will apply “further pressure on the federal government to finally deschedule marijuana nationally and end this ongoing tension between state and federal policies.”

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