|
Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
|
|
US VA: One-Issue Candidate Holds Rally On Mall
Bob Gibson Daily Progress, The (VA)
Tuesday 02 Oct 2001 Gary A. Reams is proudly and strictly a single- issue candidate. "Marijuana prohibition has failed, has done harm and has gone too far," Reams said Friday in Charlottesville. The Libertarian Party nominee for lieutenant governor said he is running solely as a way to send a message to politicians about marijuana laws. His candidacy is what he calls a "Reams Reeferendum." "A vote for Gary Reams is not a vote for the Libertarian Party or for libertarianism or even Gary Reams," the candidate said. "It is a vote for the need to reform the marijuana laws." Reams, 45, is a former chairman of the Libertarian Party of Virginia who lives in Fairfax County and works as a director of quality for NEC, an international telecommunications supplier. A veteran of six years in the U.S. Navy as an electronics technician, Reams said Virginia wastes a lot of time and money by arresting more than 15,000 people a year on marijuana charges, the majority for possession of the illegal drug. "It's not just the users who have to pay this cost" for law enforcement, court services and jail, he said. "It diverts law enforcement resources into going after marijuana users instead of going after real thugs," Reams said. Reams said he chose the lieutenant governor's race to send all politicians a message about pot because the office "is ceremonial." He said he would like to see Virginia join other the other states and Canada that are endorsing the use of marijuana for medical reasons. Reams said he is calling his campaign a referendum on pot because voters cannot put a marijuana question up for a statewide referendum in Virginia and this election allows voters a chance to say prohibition of marijuana "has gone too far." He said medical uses of marijuana should be permitted and Virginians should be allowed to grow industrial hemp as they could until the plant was banned more than 60 years ago. "Here you have a plant that you can't get high from," which still is banned by the federal government as a valuable cash crop, Reams said. Reams is one of three candidates on the Nov.6 statewide ballot for lieutenant governor. The others are Democrat Timothy M. Kaine, a former mayor of Richmond, and Del. Jay K. Katzen, a Fauqier County Republican. Kaine and Katzen said last month that they oppose legalization of marijuana.
After you have finished reading this article you can click here to go back.
|
This page was created by the Cannabis Campaigners' Guide.
Feel free to link to this page!