|
Dear Reader,
Last week in a Q & A in The
Washington Post Secretary of
Agriculture Tom Vilsack was quoted as saying
"In a perfect world, everything that was
sold, everything that was purchased and
consumed would be local, so the economy would
receive the benefit of that." Earlier this
week farmers in Vermont shared
their opinions at a well-attended public
hearing on the future of farming held by the
House and Senate Agriculture committees at
the Statehouse. Vote Hemp has been working
for nearly nine years to make this vision of
locally grown crops reality for the hemp
industry as well. It would be a positive
boost to the marketplace to have hemp farmed
and processed in the U.S. once again.
So far in this legislative season seven
states —
Hawaii,
Kentucky,
Minnesota,
Montana,
New
Hampshire, New
Mexico and North
Dakota — have introduced
resolutions and/or hemp farming bills. Both
Maine
and Vermont
are expected to introduce legislation within
the next month as well. You can keep track of
all state hemp legislation on Vote Hemp's State
Hemp Legislation Page.
Eight companies — Dr.
Bronner's Magic Soaps, French
Meadow Bakery, Hemp Oil
Canada, Hemp
Traders, Living
Harvest, Manitoba
Harvest, Merry
Hempsters and Nutiva —
have donated products to Vote Hemp to help
educate state legislative committee members
about industrial hemp so they can make
intelligent and well-informed votes on the
bills before them. These companies have been
on the leading edge of the sustainably
growing hemp food and body care markets,
which is currently estimated to be $113
million a year by the Hemp Industries
Association.
Please make a donation to the Vote Hemp General
Fund or Farmer
Fund today to help us continue our work
and bring hemp farming back to its rightful
place in America. We are also working on
other donation avenues on our Facebook,
MySpace and Change.org for those of you who
spend more time there. Please look for the
links to our social networking pages in the
Quick Links section on the right hand side of
this email. All of us working together can
have a huge impact. Let's keep it up!
Best Regards,
Tom Murphy
National Outreach Coordinator
Vote Hemp
| Hemp Advocacy |
 |
|
For many people the name lobbyist conjures up
images of well-dressed groups of people
trying to influence the decisions of
legislators and government officials. Often
times these images are negative ones, but it
need not always be so.
As constituents our elected officials should
be representing us and serving our best
interests. We at Vote Hemp like to refer to
the work our supporters do asking their
representatives to introduce hemp farming,
study bills and resolutions and supporting
them in the legislature as advocacy. To be an
effective advocate you need to learn how the
system works and where the levers of power
are, as well as a well balanced knowledge of
the issues surrounding industrial hemp.
An advocate should not resort to
misinformation or hyperbole, obvious and
intentional exaggeration, to educate people
about hemp farming. All to often well-meaning
hempsters end up sounding like an over the
top TV commercial selling something that you
don't really need, or even worse, a wild-eyed
conspiracy theorist. Your pitch should not
sound like this: "As a hardy perennial, hemp
needs no year-after-year replanting, nor
pesticides or herbicides. It doesn't need
water, either. Easily grown in the Sahara,
hemp yields thousands of gallons of oil per
acre along with tens of thousands of tons of
dry matter as well. Plus, you would have to
smoke a joint the size of a telephone pole to
just get high. It chops, it grates, it dices,
it slices, it juliennes fries in three
different ways and costs only $9.95. Order
before midnight tonight. Hemp, it's better
than magic beans!"
It's obvious to us that these statements are
not true, but to someone who does not know a
lot about the subject it sounds like you are
intentionally misleading them just to get a
law passed.
We do not want to fall into the same trap
that our opponents are in by using these
techniques. All too often we unintentionally
end up using arguments that are the opposite
of the ones that they do and since many of
those arguments are disingenuous at best,
what does that make ours? So, how can we do
better?
The best thing to do is to read up on the
issues surrounding industrial hemp. To start
with we highly recommend watching the six
minute video Controversial
Crop from Episode 315 of America's
Heartland, which is produced by KVIE in
Sacramento, California.
When you are done with that you should
download and read the Congressional Research
Service (CRS) Report Hemp
as an Agricultural Commodity by Jean
M. Rawson. You want the latest revision from
March 23, 2007.
Next please download and read the Reason
Foundation Policy Study Illegally
Green: Environmental Costs of Hemp
Prohibition by Skaidra
Smith-Heisters. You will notice that all of
these documents are from third party sources.
Now that you have some new found knowledge,
please click
here to write to your Representative in
the U.S. House and Senate urging him or her
to consider introducing a bill, or an
amendment to a bill, similar to H.R. 1009,
the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2007. Once
you have done that please check out our State
Industrial Hemp Legislation page and see
what's up in your area.
|
| Hawaii |
|
|
Hawaii had a hemp farming bill, HB 305,
introduced on 1/26/09. Provides the
authority, procedures, and licensing, related
to the production of industrial hemp in the
State. Referred to Agriculture, Judiciary,
and Finance committees on 1/26/09. The bill
was heard by the Agriculture Committee on
2/6/09 and the committee recommends that the
measure be deferred.
|
| Kentucky |
|
Kentucky had a hemp farming bill, SB 131,
introduced on 2/12/09. An Act relating to
industrial hemp. Create new sections of KRS
Chapter 260 to define "department,"
"industrial hemp," and "THC"; require persons
wanting to grow or process industrial hemp to
be licensed by the Department of Agriculture;
require criminal history checks by local
sheriff; require the Department of
Agriculture to promulgate administrative
regulations to carry out the provisions of
the Act; require sheriff to monitor and
randomly test industrial hemp fields; assess
a fee of $5 per acre for every acre of
industrial hemp grown, with a minimum fee of
$150, to be divided equally between the
Department of Agriculture and the appropriate
sheriff's department; require licensees to
provide the Department of Agriculture with
names and addresses of any grower or buyer of
industrial hemp and copies of any contracts
the licensee may have entered into relating
to the industrial hemp; clarify that the Act
does not authorize any person to violate
federal law.
|
| Minnesota |
|
|
Minnesota had a hemp farming bill, HF 0608,
introduced on 2/9/09. Industrial hemp
industry development and regulation provided,
possession and cultivation of industrial hemp
defense provided, and marijuana definition
modified. Introduced, first reading and
referred to Agriculture, Rural Economies and
Veterans Affairs Committee.
|
| Montana |
|
|
Montana had a resolution, SJ 20, introduced
on 2/7/09. Resolution urging Congress to
legalize industrial hemp. Introduced, first
reading and referred to Agriculture,
Livestock and Irrigation Committee. Committee
hearing was held on on 2/17/09. Committee
executive action on 2/19/09. Bill passed by a
vote of 9 to 0.
|
| New Hampshire |
|
|
New Hampshire had a hemp farming bill, HB
399, introduced on 1/8/09. Establishes an
industrial hemp special program fund.
Referred to the House Environment and
Agriculture Committee. Public hearing held on
2/5/2009. Tom Murphy, Vote Hemp's National
Outreach Coordinator, presented testimony in
person at the hearing. Subcommittee work
session held on 2/10/09. Executive session
held on 2/19/09.
|
| New Mexico |
|
|
New Mexico had a pair of hemp farming bills,
HB 403 and SB 377, introduced on on 1/28/09
and 1/29/09. Industrial Hemp Farming Act. An
act relating to agriculture; providing for
licensing the growing, selling and processing
of Industrial Hemp; establishing fees;
providing penalties; making an appropriation.
|
| North Dakota |
|
|
There are two new bills, HB 1549 and
HCR 3026, in North Dakota this year. One is a
bill to amend and reenact section 4-41-02 of
the North Dakota Century Code, relating to
industrial hemp, the other is a concurrent
resolution urging the United States Drug
Enforcement Administration to allow North
Dakota to regulate industrial hemp farming.
The state is also now issuing licenses to
farmers to grow hemp under existing state
law and North Dakota Department of
Agriculture rules.
In June 2007 the two North Dakota farmers
granted state hemp farming licenses, Rep.
David Monson and Wayne Hauge, filed a lawsuit
in U.S. District Court for the District of
North Dakota in an effort to end the U.S.
Drug Enforcement Administration's (DEA)
obstruction of commercial hemp farming in the
United States. The case was dismissed by the
District Court in November 2007. The
prospective hemp farmers have appealed the
decision to the United States Court of
Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and an opinion
is expected in early to mid 2009. Please see
the Vote Hemp North Dakota Case page for the
latest information on the case.
|
|
Current Action Alert |
|
|
|
Nationwide: Click
here to write to your Representative in
the U.S. House and Senate urging him or her
to consider introducing a bill, or an
amendment to a bill, similar to H.R. 1009,
the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2007.
|
Support Vote Hemp
|
