Ann Marie Borges, et al. v. County of Mendocino, California
AdministrativeLaw SocialSecurity DueProcess JusticiabilityDoctri
Whether the Supreme Court should revisit Gonzales v. Raich to reverse the irrebuttable presumption that all cannabis is part of interstate commerce
QUESTION PRESENTED On March 6, 2023, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit filed it’s unpublished memorandum affirming the district court order dismissing due process claim that the County of Mendocino arbitrarily and capriciously denied their application for a cannabis cultivation permit. The Ninth Circuit held: as no federally protected property interest exists in cultivating marijuana, the district court properly dismissed Plaintiffs’ substantive due process claims. While Plaintiffs attempt to “prove the marijuana in question is part of intrastate commerce,” we cannot revisit Gonzales v. Raich, 545 USS. 1 (2005), which upheld the CSA as a valid exercise of Congress’s Commerce Clause authority as it is in the Supreme Court’s “prerogative alone to overrule one of its precedents.” State Oil Co. v. Khan, 522 US. 3, 20 (1997). The timely Petition for Rehearing En Banc was denied on April 19, 2023. State law creates property rights for purposes of 42 U.S.C. §1983 (Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564 (1972)) and the State of California created property rights in cannabis, see Cal. Bus & Prof. Code §§2600026250. Thus, the Ninth Circuit’s ruling instanter violates the property rights of the Petitioners and millions of other citizens in the 38 sovereign states which have created cannabis related property rights. The question presented is whether this court should exercise its sole prerogative to revisit Gonzales v. Raich, 545 U.S. 1 (2005) to reverse the irrebuttable li QUESTION PRESENTED — Continued presumption that all cannabis is part of interstate commerce and replace it with a presumption rebuttable by state licensed property owners. This would vindicate citizens’ and states’ rights protected by the Fifth, Ninth, Tenth and Fourteenth Amendments and “return that authority to the people and their elected representatives.” Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 142 S. Ct. 2228 (2022).