Ashcroft besieges the states

Those famous supporters of states' rights, the Bush administration...

Attorney General John Ashcroft has strongly opposed the state laws. The case the Supreme Court accepted began with a confrontation between sheriff's deputies in Butte County, Calif., and federal drug agents, who both showed up at the home of Diana Monson, a patient whose severe back spasms are not helped by prescription drugs but are alleviated by marijuana, which she uses under her doctor's care. The sheriff's deputies concluded that the marijuana she was growing was legal, but the federal agents seized and destroyed her plants after a three-hour standoff with the deputies [emphasis added].

That must have been an interesting sight: sheriff's deputies protecting plants against federal agents determined to kill them (the plants, I mean, I guess).

Ashcroft continues to have his priorities in place.