- The Record Archives
- Volume CXVIII, No. XIX - November 3, 2005 -
Students propose new marijuana club
The Record
A group of CSB/SJU students are hoping to become a club with one goal in mind: legalizing marijuana.
Last Friday, students attended a debate about the legalization of marijuana. The interactive event, held in the Stephen B. Humphrey auditorium at SJU, featured two speakers for this controversial topic.
"For one thing, hemp is a good medicine, and the production and use of hemp products is good for the environment," said Steven Hager, founder of the Cannabis Cup, a competition in which judges marijuana quality, and former editor of High Times magazine.
"For another, marijuana is a part of my culture. This is a matter of freedom of religion."
"The present policy does have errors in terms of prison sentencing for drug users," said Robert Stutman, a 25-year veteran of the Drug Enforcement Agency and former director of the organization's New York City chapter. "But if we legalize marijuana, we'll see a great increase in the number of users. Even Steve Hager agrees with that."
The implications of the debate were quickly visible. A group of students, at the encouragement of Hager, immediately set out to establish a pro-legalization movement on campus.
The group, led unofficially by sophomore Jason Kaas, will seek the sponsorship of Students for a Sensible Drug Policy, an outside group that helps establish pro-legalization clubs on campuses throughout the country.
"Weed has a pretty negative stigma attached to it," Kaas said. "Having an organization on campus would increase the amount of debate on this issue and give people a degree of awareness that they need to make a responsible choice for themselves."
The administrations are somewhat concerned about problems the group's existence could potentially cause. However, they support the cause in and of itself.
"A group that is trying to change a law isn't the issue," said Jody Terhaar, CSB dean of student life. "Drugs are a hot-button topic, and students need to approach it carefully."
She said she is concerned about the control of the group.
"The problem would be if SSDP was actually running the group, and the students here were merely its puppets," Terhaar said. "We need students who know the campus environment to be calling the shots."
Both Terhaar and Jason Laker, SJU dean of student life, support the idea of free speech.
"This is an educational institution," Laker said. "And as long as students approach the issues in a careful, intelligent way, they ought to be exploring the gamut of political issues and how this university can provide the means to assist them in doing so."
Kaas said he is confident his campus group can avoid those complications.
"SSDP gives you the resources to start," he said. "Ultimately, it's up to the students to be motivated to come together and make the group effective."