SANTA FE, N.M.—Today, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of New Mexico pledged to continue to fight the injustices caused by the criminalization of marijuana in New Mexico after Senate Joint Resolution 10, a proposed constitutional amendment that would legalize marijuana in New Mexico, died in committee.

 

“The criminalization of marijuana creates far more problems in our society than the drug itself,” said ACLU of New Mexico Executive Director Peter Simonson. “A new study from the ACLU shows that although people of color do not use marijuana at rates higher than white people, they make up the vast majority of marijuana arrests. We cannot afford to continue wasting millions of dollars arresting and incarcerating people on the basis of race and for possessing a substance that’s safer than alcohol.”

 

In June of 2013, the national ACLU released an exhaustive report, The War on Marijuana in Black and White,  that showed that laws criminalizing marijuana were overwhelmingly enforced with racial bias against people of color. Some of the major findings include:

 

• Marijuana arrests are on the rise in the U.S.
• Marijuana arrests now account for 52% of all drug-related arrests, the vast majority of these for mere possession
• Although people of color and white people use marijuana at the same rates, people of color are dramatically more likely to be arrested for possession than white people (on average a black person is 3.73 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person)

 

The report concludes that  the War on Marijuana, like the larger War on Drugs of which it is a part, is a failure. It has needlessly ensnared hundreds of thousands of people in the criminal justice system, had a staggeringly disproportionate impact of African-Americans, and comes at a tremendous human and financial cost.

 

“We will continue to seek ways to lessen the negative impacts of the destructive War on Marijuana,” said ACLU-NM Director of Public Policy Steven Allen. “This racially biased policy of prohibition hurts our families and our communities. We need to legalize or decriminalize marijuana and start treating drug abuse as a public health problem, not a criminal justice problem.”

 

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Albuquerque Native Joins Nationwide Campaign to Win Marriage for Same-Sex Couples in All 50 States.

 httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGtq95lsw1A&feature=youtu.be

ALBUQUERQUE, NM—Today, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the ACLU of New Mexico unveiled a new marriage equality video featuring Jesse Tyler Ferguson, star of ABC's Modern Family and his husband Justin Mikita, filmed during their recent visit to New Mexico.
 
The video was produced as part of the ACLU’s new nationwide campaign, “Out for Freedom,” to bring the freedom to marry to the entire country. As vocal supporters of the importance of the freedom to marry, Jesse and Justin discuss their own relationship and their advocacy efforts to spread the freedom to marry in Jesse's home state of New Mexico, as well as highlighting the national movement for equality for all loving, committed couples.
Since dismantling the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the ACLU remains committed to spreading the freedom to marry—state-by-state—through the legislatures, the courts, and at the ballot box. Currently 17 states plus DC allow same-sex couples to marry and we are well on our way to 20+ states by the time the issue comes back to the Supreme Court.

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This video was produced in part by the Why Marriage Matters New Mexico campaign, a joint project of the national ACLU, the ACLU of New Mexico, Equality New Mexico, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and Freedom to Marry to promote the marriage equality in New Mexico.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – New Mexico Second Judicial District Judge Nan Nash today issued a landmark decision that terminally ill, mentally competent patients have a fundamental right to aid in dying under the substantive due process clause of the New Mexico State Constitution. This ruling protects the medical practice from prosecution in Bernalillo County, New Mexico. If affirmed, the ruling will impact the entire state.

Judge Nash explained her ruling as follows:

“This Court cannot envision a right more fundamental, more private or more integral to the liberty, safety and happiness of a New Mexican than the right of a competent, terminally ill patient to choose aid in dying. If decisions made in the shadow of one’s imminent death regarding how they and their loved ones will face that death are not fundamental and at the core of these constitutional guarantees, than what decisions are?... The Court therefore declares that the liberty, safety and happiness interest of a competent, terminally ill patient to choose aid in dying is a fundamental right under our New Mexico Constitution.”

Nash’s ruling followed two days of trial testimony on Dec. 11-12 in a suit, Morris v. New Mexico, filed in the state’s Second Judicial District Court by the ACLU of New Mexico and Compassion & Choices on behalf of two physicians and a cancer patient.

“New Mexicans, both healthy and sick,  now enjoy the comfort and peace of mind that come with knowing they can prevent a prolonged, agonized dying process at the end of life,” said ACLU of New Mexico Legal Director Laura Schauer Ives. “The court  agreed that the New Mexico Constitution guarantees  terminally ill patients they do not have to stay trapped in a dying process they find unbearable."

The New Mexico Psychological Association filed an amicus brief supporting the suit. It concluded: “the practice of good professional psychology in New Mexico requires that the law…recognize that aid in dying is not a form of suicide.”

Four other states affirmatively permit aid in dying: Oregon, Washington, Montana, and Vermont.

The ability to make choices in the final stages of terminal illness matters deeply to New Mexicans like 50-year-old Santa Fe resident Aja Riggs, who was diagnosed with advanced uterine cancer and was the patient plaintiff in Morris v. New Mexico. Riggs is currently in remission, but realizes that statistically her cancer is likely to return.

"I am really pleased that the courts have recognized that terminally ill patients should have more choice in the manner of their death,” said Riggs. “Knowing that I can choose a more peaceful and gentle death at the end gives me great comfort and peace of mind.”

Two Albuquerque oncologists, Dr. Aroop Mangalik and Dr. Katherine Morris, are also plaintiffs in the case. Dr. Morris previously practiced in Oregon, where she has provided aid in dying to terminally ill patients. Dr. Morris and one of her terminally ill patients were featured in HBO’s 2011 award-winning documentary, “How to Die in Oregon.”

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