Residents of New Jersey Sparked Up in the State Capitol at their First Annual Cannabis Conference

On Sat. Oct. 18, 2014, the smell of civil
disobedience filled the streets of Trenton, NJ when a group of nearly 300
people marched through the streets of the state capital letting their battle
cries be heard. The drug war is on its last leg, and as politicians struggle to
keep control, more and more advocates for legalization across the country are
rallying together to let the government know that the law is wrong.

As was displayed in New Jersey on Saturday, the
times are definitely changing. The people are tired and have had enough of the
corruption, the lies and the rate of racially influenced socio-economic based
arrests, and are unifying to reform unjust laws regarding cannabis. With the
city of Philadelphia recently decriminalizing cannabis, it holds the weight of
being the biggest city on the east coast to appoint new measures towards the
criminality of cannabis. The people in Trenton have taken notice, and despite
what Governor Chris Christie says, are not only demanding legalization, but
also reform of the broken medical program in place.

 NJ’s first annual Cannabis Conference, organized by
Kyle Moore and Michael Ward, was the second consecutive demonstration this year
in NJ’s state capital where people peacefully consumed cannabis at 4:20 PM
amidst the presence of  law enforcement,
and zero arrests made. Among the several hundred people gathered at the state
house were several speakers and live performers which included Ed “NJ Weedman”
Forchion, Bob Witanek, Ricardo Rivera, and Jennie Stormes, mother of Jackson
Stormes, who was forced to move to Colorado to improve the quality of life
for her son who suffers from Dravet’s syndrome.

The event was sponsored by The Coalition for Medical
Marijuana of New Jersey and Decarcerate the Garden State. If ever the saying
was true that “actions speak louder than words,” it was Saturday when the
hundreds of acts of civil disobedience by NJ tax payers, from all walks of
life, gathered in Trenton to “Just say NO to Chris Christie” and his
impractical and unjust approach to the laws passed in the state.