Scalia's Death Clouds US Supreme Court Decision on Colorado's Legal WeedScalia's Death Clouds--

--US Supreme Court Decision on Colorado's Legal Weed

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/35689-scalias-death-clouds-us-supreme-court-decision-on-colorados-legal-weed

Scalia's death will likely affect several divisive, high-profile cases that are currently pending before the court — including ones that deal with abortion, unions, voting rights, affirmative action, and immigration — but marijuana activists and some legal experts are paying particularly close attention to Nebraska and Oklahoma v. Colorado.

Because the lawsuit was filed directly with the Supreme Court, no lower court has ruled on its merits. If the justices decide to take the case, they could deliver a ruling that invalidates the recreational and medical marijuana laws adopted by 23 states and Washington, DC. They could also uphold Colorado's law, setting a precedent that allows state-level legalization to continue on sturdier legal ground, or decline to hear it and allow the status quo to continue.

Experts say that Scalia's death and the fierce political fight to determine his replacement changes the dynamics of whether the court will decide to weigh in on the issue legal weed. It also raises a thorny question about what would happen the justices take the case and end up deadlocked in a 4-4 tie with no lower court ruling to fall back on.

"This is, in many respects, a one-of-a-kind kind of lawsuit with one-of-a-kind kind of claims and a one-of-a-kind moment with the politics over drug law reform," said Douglas Berman, a professor at Ohio State University's Moritz College of Law. "That might make me think the court would be willing to embrace a one-of-a-kind resolution."

Berman, who authors the Marijuana Law, Policy & Reform blog, thinks the court is unlikely to take the case, echoing an opinion voiced by several other legal experts who spoke with VICE News. Typically, four justices need to vote in favor of accepting a case, but the fact that Nebraska and Oklahoma requested to file their lawsuit directly in the Supreme Court raises an issue of jurisdiction, which means it would take five votes to agree to hear it. (US Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr. filed a brief with the court in December arguing that the suit represents "a substantial and unwarranted expansion of this Court's original jurisdiction.&quot