Victoria Litman took a second to reply to our story in regards to the Church of Iowa's years-long quest for tax exemption and vindication of its proper to make use of “huasca” in its non secular companies. She refers us to her glorious article on the subject. “Psychedelic Coverage, Non secular Liberty, and Public Security: An Overview” comprises glorious historic and up to date context. Right here is the summary:
Summary
Psychedelics are psychoactive substances (also referred to as entheogens) in addition to medicines and leisure medicine. Lately, these substances have begun to be prioritized, decriminalized and legalized on the state and native degree. Some are even within the means of changing into authorized by the FDA to be prescribed as a part of psychedelic assisted psychotherapies. On the identical time, the non secular use of those substances, rooted in historical past, has turn into extra destigmatized and spiritual organizations are more and more prepared to come back out and interact with federal companies associated to their use of unlawful medicine in a wide range of methods. As a Graduate Tax Scholar on the Georgetown College Legislation Middle, I performed analysis on the method these non secular communities are taking concerning their federal tax standing. The important thing takeaway from that preliminary analysis was that due to these authorized and cultural modifications, the variety of non secular communities utilizing psychedelics is important and rising. From the angle of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), and the federal authorities, the non secular use of psychedelics stays felony with out a non secular exemption. In response to a Supreme Court docket case in 2006, the DEA developed a constitutionally questionable non secular exemption utility course of, however has by no means voluntarily granted an exemption. Though there’s a rising variety of communities, a lot of which the federal government owns, solely three communities at the moment have federal court-ordered exemptions. The results of it is a lack of enforcement of the felony legislation pissed off by the safety of non secular freedom granted within the Structure of the USA. This text describes this present authorized panorama on the federal, state, and native ranges, how we bought there, and extra importantly, the affect of the present nonenforcement coverage on public security. In conclusion, this text proposes two doable coverage options to rework the authorized panorama from authorized protection to authorized safety, growing safety for all concerned and lowering pointless burdens on authorities companies.
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