Law Commons^™

Preemption Under The Controlled Substances Act, Robert A. Mikos

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

States are conducting increasingly bold experiments with their marijuana laws, but questions linger over their authority to deviate from the federal Controlled Substances Act. The CSA bans marijuana outright, and commentators have assumed that Congress sought to preempt all state laws that might somehow conflict with the CSA. Under the preemption rule now in vogue, state marijuana reforms are preempted if they either require someone to violate the CSA or, more controversially, if they pose an obstacle to Congress’s objective of eradicating marijuana. Seeking to avoid such conflicts, government officials have scuttled a number of important state marijuana reforms. This …