Little Rock — On Tuesday Arkansas passed a marijuana ballot measure, Issue 6. Family Council President Jerry Cox released a statement, saying, “This fight is not over. The battle now shifts to the Arkansas Legislature.”
Cox said, “A clever and grossly misleading advertising campaign funded by the marijuana industry deceived enough people into voting for a measure that is recreational marijuana masquerading as medicine. Hundreds of thousands of otherwise healthy people will soon qualify to use marijuana recreationally. It puts our children in harm’s way while a handful of businessmen get rich selling everything from marijuana candy to rolled joints as ‘medicine.’ We plan to fight tooth and nail to protect Arkansans from the consequences of this amendment.”
Cox said, “We have to find a way to mitigate the harm done when tons of so-called ‘medical marijuana’ are injected into our communities, our schools, and the workplace.”
Cox says his group already has some ideas for anti-marijuana legislation that can be introduced when the Arkansas Legislature convenes in January. “For example, we need to prevent marijuana advertising, define what it means to be impaired, clarify zoning options for cities and counties, and figure out how to keep marijuana out of our schools.”
Recently, Governor Hutchinson and eighty-four members of the Arkansas General Assembly went on record as opposing Issue 6. Cox said, “Lawmakers’ and other government officials’ hands will be tied by certain parts of the measure, and their will to change other parts will be lessened by the fact that voters chose to write marijuana into our state constitution. As things are now, the Arkansas Legislature is all that stands between the destructive power of Big Marijuana companies and the People of Arkansas.”
The Family Council is a conservative education and research organization based in Little Rock, Arkansas.
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