Legal Cannabis Raises Legal Questions On Illinois Gun Ownership

ILLINOIS — Starting Wednesday, recreational cannabis will be legal for most adults in Illinois. This is good news for many — but for gun owners, it creates a new set of problems. Gun ownership and purchase laws in Illinois are about to become more complicated.

Although recreational marijuana use is now legal at the state level, the federal government still considers it an illegal, prohibited substance. The federal government is also where most pertinent gun laws are decided. According to regulations established by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives (ATF), "an unlawful user of, or [person] addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, or narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance" is prohibited from owning or purchasing any kind of gun.

The problem here is determining what exactly "unlawful" means.

"It's all somewhat ambiguous," said Larry Dale, the owner of New Salem Firearms in St. Petersburg, Illinois.

Dale, like all firearms dealers in the state, is directly affected by this legal ambiguity, and he said he's been thinking about it for a while. Aside from the standard ATF regulations, he said he's never received written protocols about marijuana from any governmental authority, state or federal.

"This is all verbal ... we're waiting for official legal action," he said.

Further complicating matters, Illinois requires all gun owners in the state — and anyone looking to buy a gun — to have a registered Firearms Owner's Identification (FOID) card. These cards are issued by the Illinois State Police (ISP), and all prospective cardholders must first undergo an application process. Mirroring the ATF's federal regulations, FOID cardholders and applicants cannot have "within the prior year [to application] used or been addicted to a controlled substance."

People determined by the state police to have used — or have become addicted to — a controlled substance stand to lose their cards, or have their applications rejected. Under the federal government's interpretation of "controlled substance" and "addiction," this could potentially include all legal Illinois cannabis users.

"It was my understanding that [cannabis use] didn't bar them from possessing a gun — it barred them from buying a gun, which is very confusing," Dale said.

The state police, meanwhile, say that legal cannabis use is a non-issue for Illinois FOID cardholders and applicants. ISP released a statement to Patch indicating that no FOID cardholder or applicant would lose their card or be rejected simply for legally using pot.

"The Illinois State Police will not revoke Firearm's Owner's Identification Cards based solely on a person's legal use of adult-use cannabis," ISP public information officer Sgt. Jacqueline Cepeda said via email.

However, at least one Illinois FOID cardholder has already had their card revoked for legal medical marijuana use, with little explanation offered by the state police. Additionally, Cepeda offered another statement that seemed to add to the ambiguity.

"Pursuant to both State and Federal law, a person who is addicted to or a habitual user of narcotics is not permitted to possess or use firearms," she said. "Accordingly, the ISP will revoke FOID cards where it is demonstrated that an individual is addicted to or is a habitual user of cannabis."

Cepeda did not state what parameters define "habitual" use of cannabis or how state police would determine that a cardholder or applicant was a "habitual user." She also did not say if revoking a person's FOID card also meant confiscating any weapons they already possessed.

Faced with all of these open questions, Dale said he can only do what he's always done, even before legal cannabis laws passed: follow the ATF sale procedures he's been given, trust his customers to be honest and use his best judgment.

"I'm relying on their written comments," he said. "If they are buying a gun and they mark, 'Yes I smoke marijuana' on the form, my instructions are, you do not proceed with the gun buy ... there's also something to the effect that if somebody comes in and, for whatever reason, I believe that their answers are nontruthful or they're evasive or something else is going on, regardless of anything else, [I am] allowed to not permit the sale to go forward without any fear of recrimination."

Dale said he was never given any official way of testing a potential customer's drug habits; all he has to go on is the standard questionnaire. He said officials have told him that more-detailed protocols may be put in place at a later date, but for now the wiggle room for dishonesty is wide. Lying about drug use on a gun purchase form is a felony, but it is unclear how Dale or any other firearms dealer could prove that someone is lying about their drug use.

"You could make the judgment that it just didn't seem right," Dale said.

The legally porous environment for gun ownership and gun procurement created by the conflicting cannabis laws has only added to the criticism of state and national drug laws from people on both sides of the political spectrum. Some conservatives opposed marijuana legalization altogether, citing specifically the challenges to law enforcement it could create. Alternatively, leftists and some liberals — they're not the same thing — have made arguments for nationwide legalization of marijuana and other controlled substances: It's better to be rid of contradictory laws altogether, they say, and not just the ones about guns.

Whatever one's views, it is clear that Illinois residents who want to own or purchase guns as well as enjoy weed are in a nebulous legal zone. They are both at the mercy of firearms merchants, whose personal views on marijuana may affect how they conduct business, and under the scrutiny of state police, whose record on dealing with the intersection of weed and guns does not seem entirely consistent.

"You don't know what to do, so I have a much narrower a focus," Dale said. "If someone is trying to buy a gun and they answer in a way that they are saying they are a user of marijuana ... it simply stops the deal."