Your Totally Awesome Law of the Day
When Ron Paul and Barney Frank get together to write a bill, you know it’s going to be good:
Sponsored by Reps. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) and Barney Frank (D-Mass.), the bill would allow U.S. farmers to grow industrial, non-psychoactive hemp, which manufacturers use for everything from soap to shoes to car upholstery. Current law allows hemp to be imported, but not cultivated domestically.
Introducing the bill on the House floor yesterday, Paul said that prohibition is a mistake, particularly in a difficult economy.
“It is unfortunate that the Federal Government has stood in the way of American farmers, including many who are struggling to make ends meet, competing in the global industrial hemp market. Indeed, the founders of our Nation, some of whom grew hemp, would surely find that Federal restrictions on farmers growing a safe and profitable crop on their own land are inconsistent with the constitutional guarantee of a limited, restrained Federal Government.”
Aside from Paul and Frank, nine other House lawmakers have signed on their support, seven Democrats and two Republicans.