On Tuesday — after six months of petitioning — MCCC turned in nearly 500,000 signatures to qualify a medical marijuana measure for the November 2008 ballot in Michigan. On the same day — after only two months of petitioning — CSMP turned in more than 100,000 signatures to qualify a marijuana decriminalization initiative for the November 2008 ballot in Massachusetts.

I'd like to thank all the hard-working petitioners in Michigan and Massachusetts who helped MCCC and CSMP realize these achievements.

Would you please consider making a contribution to the campaigns in Michigan and Massachusetts to ensure passage of both measures next year?

Both initiatives are crucial to advancing marijuana policy reform in this country. Passage of MPP's Michigan initiative would mean that almost one-quarter of the nation would live in states with medical marijuana laws. Michigan would become the 13th medical marijuana state — joining Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington — and the first medical marijuana state in the Midwest.

In Massachusetts, turning in this first round of signatures means we are one step closer to the first time in history that an initiative to decriminalize marijuana will be placed on any statewide ballot. In the spring, if the state legislature does not enact the initiative into law itself, CSMP will have to collect an additional 11,099 valid signatures in order to place the decriminalization initiative on the November 2008 ballot. But that will be relatively easy compared to the first — much larger — round of signature-gathering that was just completed in Massachusetts.