Holder and U.S. Attorney sued by Americans for Safe Access for violating 10th Amendment

On October 27, Americans for Safe Access filed suit against Attorney General Eric Holder and U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag of the Northern District of California as the representatives of the U.S. Department of Justice accusing it of acting in violation of the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution for threatening California cities that were implementing the California's medical marijuana laws.

The Tenth Amendment provides, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved the the States respectively, or to the people." Various powers prohibited to the States are set forth in Article I, section 10.

The Tenth Amendment has rarely been the ground for litigation and the Supreme Court has said little about its meaning and scope.

This could be another ground breaking case of constitutional interpretation arising from the conflict between the People of California and the U.S government around the use of marijuana for medical purposes. In the last big case, Raich, the government won, 6 to 3, a restatement of a very broad reach for national government power under the commerce clause.

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