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Feds: States Decide on Pot Use

Will be allowed to regulate the drug.

Let the smoky celebrations ensue. After 75 years of federal prohibition, new legislation allows states the right to decide whether citizens may use, grow, sell, and buy marijuana. Last fall, Washington and Colorado voted to legalize the drug, and now, the Justice Department has given states the power to oversee both medical and recreational industries, along with adoption of regulatory plans. But in a memo to all U.S. attorney offices, Deputy Attorney General James Cole warned that policy must safeguard public health and safety, saying, "If state enforcement efforts are not sufficiently robust ... the federal government may seek to challenge the regulatory structure itself."