Quote Originally Posted by HighPopalorum
Obvious response: where in the Const is this right enshrined? It isn't in A20, which deals with patients' rights exclusively. Hell, the Const "enshrines" (lol) gambling in this state, but that doesn't mean Harrah's can build a casino anywhere they like. Likewise, Kathleen Chippi and other commercial operators cannot set up shop where she is not welcome. You're on real shaky legal ground, since the local option has been a matter of settled law since the end of alcohol prohibition. Just as there are still wet and dry counties, there will be green counties which allow MJ sales and "brown counties" which do not.

FWIW, the cover story of Reason is on legalization, and the local option is discussed briefly. (and complimentarily, as you would expect in a libertarian magazine.)
I'm not aware of any dry counties in Colorado, but then I haven't tried to drink in all of them. My point was that any attempt to regulate/legislate that has the effect of impacting the exercise of a constitutional right, in this case the right of a medical marijuana licensee to obtain and use their medicine, such as it is, is subject to a higher level of scrutiny if challenged. I don't know that "We don't want it here, nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah"( oh, sorry, "they're not welcome") would be found to be sufficient to defeat the right to smoke the chronic. If the Colorado Supreme Court were to subject 1284 and/or 109 to what is called "strict scrutiny", which would be consistent with precedent when it comes to an explicit constitutional right, well, lets just say that vanishingly few laws subjected to "strict scrutiny" survive such scrutiny.

As for the situation with alcohol, it is utterly inapposite, as no constitutional provision creates any right to obtain, possess, or consume alcohol, medicinally or otherwise. And if I'm not mistaken, the enshrinement (actually a term of art among those with a legal education, but I'm glad you find it amusing) of gambling in the Colorado constitution actually specifies the locales in which it is to be allowed, a type of specificity which I don't believe is present in Amendment 20. Correct me if I'm wrong.

The shaky legal ground is actually under your feet, my condescending correspondent.