Public opinion has little to do with votes not preformed by the people.Most laws that are passed I think something like seventy five percent are not in line with public opinion. Matters not if democrats or republicans are voting the people always get screwed. This is allowed to keep going on because for over a hundred years we have had a two party system that has become in league with each other and large special interest groups. If you really think about it both democrats and republicans should be on board for legalization. From the democrat side they should be in support just for the fact that they love to tax the shit out of people and MJ would be a great way to get that done. Supposedly republicans are for smaller government and less regulation but still they shoot down bills that would allow us to live more freely. Here is the real deal more than fifty percent of drugs coming to this country from the evil cartels is MJ , thus if we legalize you take a big chunk of their bizz good thing right? You see if we keep it illegal and continue to lock up our citizens we then keep the prisons running, the DEA running, FBI, you pick. This all creates jobs while quote getting ride of the undesirables. Remember here in the supposed freest country in the world we lock up more of our citizens than any other country, this includes places like Russia, China, and even North Korea which literally has concentration camps. Wake up folks its not just the republicans or the democrats its us verses the US government and we are getting our ass kicked.