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Georgia Marijuana Legalization Amendment (2016)
| Marijuana Legalization Amendment | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Election date November 8, 2016 | |
| Topic Marijuana | |
| Status Not on the ballot | |
| Type Constitutional amendment | Origin State legislature |
| Voting on Marijuana | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| Ballot Measures | |||
| By state | |||
| By year | |||
| Not on ballot | |||
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The Georgia Marijuana Legalization Amendment was not put on the November 8, 2016 ballot in Georgia as a legislatively referred constitutional amendment.
The measure, upon approval, would have required the state legislature to legalize and regulate recreational marijuana for individuals 21 years of age or older. Revenue from taxes and fees on the production and sale of marijuana would be allocated to the regulatory operation expenses involved. Following the payment of regulatory expenses, the remaining revenue would be divided equally between education and transportation infrastructure purposes.[1]
The amendment was introduced into the Georgia Legislature by Sen. Curt Thompson (D-5) as Senate Resolution 6.
Text of measure
Ballot title
The proposed ballot title was:[1]
| “ | Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to authorize the General Assembly to provide by general law for the legalization and regulation of the production and sale of marijuana for personal use by individuals 21 years of age or older and may further provide that the taxes from such production and sale shall be appropriated equally between educational programs and purposes and capital outlay projects for transportation infrastructure purposes within this state? ( ) Yes ( ) No[2] |
” |
Constitutional changes
- See also: Article III, Georgia Constitution
The proposed amendment was designed to add a Subparagraph (o) to Section 9, Paragraph 4 of Article III of the Georgia Constitution. The following text would have been added by the proposed measure's approval:[1]
Path to the ballot
The proposed constitutional amendment was filed by Sen. Curt Thompson (D-5) as Senate Resolution 6 on November 24, 2014.[1] The amendment needed to be approved by a two-thirds (66.67%) vote in both chambers of the Georgia Legislature in order to appear on a ballot. Georgia is one of sixteen states that requires a two-thirds supermajority.
The Georgia Legislature's 2015 session ended on April 2, 2015, without the bill passing both chambers. Legislators had the opportunity to reintroduce the bill during the 2016 legislative session, which was projected to begin on January 11, 2016, and run through March 31, 2016.
Related measures
The first attempt to legalize marijuana through the initiative process came in 1972, when California activists got an initiative certified for the ballot. The measure was defeated. Marijuana legalization advocates had their breakthrough election in 2012, when both Washington and Colorado legalized recreational marijuana. Oregonians rejected a legalization measure that same year, but approved one two years later in 2014. As of the beginning of 2016, recreational marijuana had been legalized in four states and Washington, D.C. All legalizations came through the initiative process. As of the beginning of 2016, medical marijuana was legal in 25 states.[3]
More than 60 statewide marijuana-related initiatives were submitted for the 2016 ballot. The table below shows the marijuana-related measures that qualified for the 2016 election ballot:
The following table includes past initiative attempts in the United States to legalize marijuana:
See also
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Georgia Legislature, "Senate Resolution 6," accessed December 2, 2014
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source. Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; name "quotedisclaimer" defined multiple times with different content - ↑ ProCon.org, "25 Legal Medical Marijuana States and DC," June 28, 2016
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State of Georgia Atlanta (capital) |
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