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225 So. 2d 330

Docket No. 37835.

Raines v. State

Gene RAINES, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Florida

Decided July 2, 1969.

Supreme Court of Florida · decided 1969-07-02

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““After argument and upon consideration of the briefs of the parties and study of the record, we have determined that appellant’s contentions are wholly without merit. Marijuana is a harmful, mind-altering drug. It endangers the health of the user and is highly detrimental to the public welfare. This drug is within the category of injurious substances which the Legislature may regulate and prohibit in the exercise of its police power. No fundamental rights of the individual are violated thereby.” Raines v. State, supra, page 330. “Questions of a similar nature have been raised in other jurisdictions and whenever the issue has been presented it has been uniformly held that marijuana is a narcotic drug for purposes of statutory interpretation. (Spence v. Sacks, 173 Ohio St. 419 , 183 N. E. 2d 363 ; People v. Stark, 157 Colo. 59 , 400 Pac. 2d 923 ; Gonzales v. State, 163 Tex. Crim. Rep. 432, 293 S. W. 2d 786 ; State v. Jackson (Del.), 239 Atl. 2d 215; Commonwealth v. Leis (Mass.), 243 N. E. 2d 898 ; Escobio v. State (Fla.), 64 So. 2d 766 ; United States v. Ford Coupe Automobile, 83 Fed. Supp. 866.)” People v. Sheridan, supra, pages 655, 656.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 47 Wis. 2d 321 - State v. Weidner

Relies on Commonwealth v. Leis

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1969-07-02

How this case has been cited

Cited by 9 later decisions — most recently March 1984

9 state decisions

60196919701980decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1John D. Buchanan, Jr., Asst. Public Defender, and Joseph S. Oteri of Crane, Inker & Oteri, Boston, Mass., for appellant.

¶2Earl Faircloth, Atty. Gen., and Raymond L. Marky, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

¶3BOYD, Justice.

¶4This cause is before us on appeal from the decision of the Circuit Court of Leon County upholding the validity of Chapter 398, Florida Statutes, F.S.A., on motion to dismiss and sentencing defendant, appellant herein, to six months' imprisonment and two years' probation for violation thereof. Because the trial court passed directly on the validity of a state statute, this Court has jurisdiction under Article V, Section 4, of the Florida Constitution, F.S.A.

¶5Appellant was informed against on two counts of the sale of marijuana. He moved to dismiss the information on the grounds that Chapter 398, Florida Statutes, F.S.A., the Narcotic Drug Act, violates the Federal and State Constitutions. The parties stipulated that all transcribed evidence used in the case of Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Leis[1] would be admitted into evidence in connection with the appellant's motion to dismiss. In denying the motion to dismiss, the trial court specifically adopted by reference the thirty-one page order of Honorable G. Joseph Tauro, Chief Justice of the Superior Court of Massachusetts, in the Leis case, which order upheld the comparable Massachusetts Statutes.[2]

¶6On appeal to this Court, appellant seeks to challenge the Constitutionality of the entire narcotic drug law on the grounds that marijuana is not dangerous, a point on which he says this Court must make an independent factual determination. He contends that the narcotic drug law is irrational and unreasonable; goes beyond the proper exercise of the police power; violates equal protection of the law guarantees; and provides for penalties which are cruel and excessive punishment.

¶7After argument and upon consideration of the briefs of the parties and study of the record, we have determined that appellant's contentions are wholly without merit. Marijuana is a harmful, mind-altering drug. It endangers the health of the user and is highly detrimental to the public welfare. This drug is within the category of injurious substances which the Legislature may regulate and prohibit in the exercise of its police power. No fundamental rights of the individual are violated thereby.

¶8*331 The trial court was correct in denying the motion to dismiss and its decision is accordingly,

¶9Affirmed.

¶10ROBERTS, DREW and ADKINS, JJ., concur.

¶11ERVIN, C.J., concurs in judgment of affirmance.

NOTES

¶12[1] Unreported lower court decision.

¶13[2] Judge Tauro's decision was subsequently affirmed January 9, 1969, in Commonwealth v. Leis, 243 N.E.2d 898 (Sup.Jud. Ct. Mass. 1969).

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