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Activists Call for Mississippi Supreme Court to Reconsider Ruling

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Activists Call for Mississippi Supreme Court to Reconsider Ruling

This past Friday, May 28th, hundreds of Mississippi activists gathered in Jackson to protest recent changes. Earlier this month, the Mississippi Supreme Court overruled IM 65, an initiative measure to legalize medical cannabis use for qualifying patients. It came down to how the Mississippi Constitution is written. The state used to have five districts when the law was written. It said no more than ⅕ of siguates can come from a district. Now, the state only has four districts. This makes it mathematically impossible for signatures not to exceed ⅕ total signatures from a district. 

Several leaders are now calling for Governor Reeves (R) to call for a special session of congress. This would allow lawmakers to create a reasonable and similar legislative measure surrounding medical cannabis the Mississippi people overwhelmingly approved. 74 percent of voters in the state approved the measure. There was also a chance Michael Watson, the Secretary of State, would ask the Supreme Court to reconsider their ruling. However, he decided not to ask for a reconsideration. He instead opted for urging the governor to call for a special session

Secretary of State

The biggest reason that Secretary of State Michael Watson didn’t consider asking for the Supreme Court to reconsider their ruling was because of the final vote of 6-3. A ⅔ majority made the final decision on IM 65, despite what voters said. The law, as written, is mathematically impossible to follow, so any initiative is null and void. And Supreme Court Justices uphold the law, as written. 

With this in mind, Secretary Watson took to Twitter to express his reasoning:

“While I strongly considered petitioning the Supreme Court for a rehearing of its decision…I reached the conclusion doing so would simply delay the inevitable.

“Rather than giving a sense of false hope and spending taxpayer dollars to no avail, I strongly encourage the Governor to reconvene the legislature in an effort to quickly preserve the will of Mississippians…

“In talking with voters around the state, many feel as though their voices are not being heard. We work for them and should do all we can to honor their decisions at the ballot box.”

Governor Response

Governor Reeves has said that his office is considering calling for a special session, but that there is more to consider. 

“The people have spoken. They made their voice heard and voted overwhelmingly to have a program and Mississippi should have that,” he said to a local news station. “(A special session) is something we are certainly willing to consider. [However] we are a long way from being able to make that decision.”

While his office determines if they want to call for a special session or not, the people of Mississippi will continue to express their voices outside his house and outside Congress. 

Make sure to check back for more cannabis and hemp related news.