Ann Arbor Legalizes Medical Marijuana
What a difference 35 years makes. In 1969, John Sinclair was sentenced to ten years for two joints. Tuesday, Ann Arbor passed a ballot initiative to legalize medical marijuana and lower fines for third and subquent offenses relating to non-medical marijuana use--including offenses of using, buying, selling or possessing marijuana.
Ann Arbor residents passed a ballot proposal, to allow the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes, yesterday. Proposal C will waive fines for medical marijuana patients and their caregivers who receive the recommendation of a physician or other qualified health professional to use marijuana for medical treatment.
The proposal also changes the current law in Ann Arbor to lower the fine for the third and all subsequent marijuana offenses for non medical users to $100. These fines include possession, control, use, giving away or selling of marijuana.
[link via Drug WarRant]
John Lennon wrote a song about John Sinclair, called "John Sinclair." Here are the lyrics.
It ain't fair, John Sinclair
In the stir for breathing air
Won't you care for John Sinclair?
In the stir for breathing air
Let him be, set him free
Let him be like you and meThey gave him ten for two
What else can the judges do?
Gotta, gotta, gotta, gotta,
gotta, gotta, gotta, gotta,
gotta, gotta, gotta, gotta,
gotta, gotta, gotta set him freeIf he'd been a soldier man
Shooting gooks in Vietnam
If he was the CIA
Selling dope and making hay
He'd be free, they'd let him be
Breathing air, like you and me
Here's a little piece of history. The poster is currently selling for $600.00 .
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Who else was around Ann Arbor and Detroit in 1969 - 1971? The MC-5, Iggy Pop and the Stooges, Bob Seger, Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen, the Amboy Dukes (Ted Nugent), Alice Cooper, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some.
35 years... for those who go back as far as Trans Love Energies , the White Panther Party, The Rainbow People's Party, John Sinclair and the 1971 Free Sinclair concert, as Jerry Garcia once sang, "what a long, strange trip it's been."
On the other hand, instead of Richard Nixon, we have George W. Bush. Maybe we haven't come that far after all.
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Footnote 1: On the White Panther Party :
The WHITE PANTHER PARTY evolved out of the extremist, high-energy, electric madness of the MC5 and their manager John Sinclair. The idea came about during meetings at their Hill street commune. Their “ten point program” and statement of November 1st, 1968 included:
“We demand the end of money… Free food, clothing, housing… free access to the information media—free technology from the greed creeps! Free the people from their phony “leaders”… Total assault on the culture by any means necessary, including rock n’ roll, dope and f**cking in the streets.”[ix] This high-powered, LSD-fueled, red-hot guerilla fighting rock ‘n roll unit used dadaist technique, satire, rants, situationist detournement, and post-modernist terminology in their all-out BLAST to crush the rancid walls of hypocrisy and the repressive war-mongering authority control.
Footnote 2: The Rainbow Peoples Party
The rise of the RAINBOW PEOPLES PARTY, was organized while John was in prison doing ten years, railroaded for possession of two joints. The idea was to coalesce all the various “tribes” across the country into one strong, vibrant, united front. WOODSTOCK NATION via Abbie Hoffman had been in common usage, but it was decided that the term RAINBOW PEOPLE was the most inclusive and descriptive of the new inter-tribal band of brothers and sisters.
THE RAINBOW PEOPLES PARTY was an experiment with large aspirations. It included a bakery, food co-op, walk in clinic, band booking department, graphics department and various other subsidiaries. It reached too far with too little capital and folded its colored tent as the last of Sinclair’s collectives.
Footnote 3: I had the best college job ever from 1969 to 1971 in Ann Arbor...working at the Discount Records store where all these groups came by at one time or another.
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