norml23 - Page 37



Page 37 Previous , Next , Original Image
Return to Index

 between the Attorney General and the Secretary of
 HEW, in accordance with their respective spheres of
 expertise. Section 201(d) directs the Attorney
 General, as an initiaJ matter, to make a legal
 judgment as to controJs necessitated by
 international commitments° He then establishes a
 minimum scheduJe or _evel of control below which
 placement of the substance may not falt.
 Determination of a minimum schedule ensures that
 the Secretary's recommendation, which ordinarily
 would be binding as to medical and scientific
 findings, does not cause a substance to be
 scheduled in violation of treaty obligation,so
 However, once the minimum schedule is established
 by the Attorney General, the decision whether to
 impose controls more restrictive than required by
 treaty impEicates the same medicaJ and scientific
 considerations as do scheduling decisions regarding
 those few substances not controlled by treaty. The
 Secretary of HEW is manifestly more competent to
 make these nonlegal evaluations and
 recommendations°
 NORML v. DEA, supra, 559 Fo2d at 747.
 The Court then turned to the questions of whether the letter from
 the Acting Assistant Secretary for Health was an adequate substitute
 for Section 201(a)o(c) procedures, and whether the letter's conclusion
 that marijuana had no currently accepted medical uses required a denial
 of the NORML petition, as the DEA's final order had concluded. The
 Court first ruled that medical use was only one of several factors
 which must be considered in rescheduting:
 If, as respondent contends, a determination that
 the substance has no accepted medicaJ use ends the
 inquiry, then presumably Congress would have
 spelled that out in its procedural guide_ineso Its
 failure to do so indicates an intent to reserve to
 HEW a finely tuned balancing process invoh4ng
 several medical and scientific considerations. By
 shortcutting the referral procedures of Section




Previous , Next , Return to Index