Canada's Senate gave final passage Tuesday June 19,2018 to the federal government's bill to legalize cannabis, though Canadians will have to wait some months to legally buy marijuana as their country becomes the second in the world to make pot legal nationwide.
Canada is following the lead of Uruguay in allowing a nationwide, legal marijuana market, although each Canadian province is working up its own rules for pot sales. The federal government and the provinces also still need to publish regulations that will govern the cannabis trade.The bill passed in the Senate by a vote of 52-29.
"We have seen in the Senate tonight a historic vote that ends 90 years of prohibition of cannabis in this country, 90 years of needless criminalization, 90 years of a just-say-no approach to drugs that hasn't worked," said independent Sen. Tony Dean, who sponsored the bill in the upper house.
Canada is the largest developed country to end a nationwide prohibition on marijuana use. In the neighboring U.S., nine states and the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana. California, home to one in eight Americans, launched the United States' biggest legal marijuana marketplace on Jan.
Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould tweeted that it was a "historic milestone for progressive policy in Canada as we shift our approach to cannabis"
Health Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor tweeted she was thrilled that the Senate approved the bill. "We're on the cusp of a sensible, responsible and equitable cannabis policy," she said
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