HISTORY OF MAINE VOCALS   FROM DON CHRISTEN, MAINE VOCALS FOUNDER

MAINE VOCALS was started in late 1989 to end marijuana prohibition, just because we were not criminals for use of or sales of or for growing marijuana. Soon thereafter I read the Emperor Wears No Clothes by Jack Herer, which enlightened me as to all the other reasons for re-legalizing marijuana, which is actually Cannabis- Hemp, Marijuana. This book really blew our minds as to the real reasons for the prohibition of Cannabis, and made all who read it very aware that we were actually getting screwed by our government and the Corporations that benefited from its ban all for their profits and financial gains at the peoples expense. So we immediately went into a different mode for legalization and it was to re-legalize Cannabis-Hemp Marijuana for medicinal use, to bring back the hemp industry, and free ourselves from the oppression of the ridiculous laws that make us criminals for nothing other than greed and corruption at the highest levels of government and business.

We held rallies and protests in the early years, and started our festivals which Hempstock was the start of in 1991. Then we started Harvest Festival a couple of years later in 1994, both at Harry Brown's Farm in Starks Maine. I then brought Maine Vocals to Vienna to Nitro's Farm and built Freedom Festival a few years later which I ended up moving to Harry Brown's Farm along with the other festivals. All Festivals are held as fundraisers to finance our endeavors for ending prohibition. These festivals continue today, with the addition of our Somerset County Jam Fest and Webejammin Fest which were started in Norridgewock at the Red Barn Rd. location. Besides the original funding for starting and running the Maine Vocals, which was funded with weed through growing in those years, which I was busted for in 1994, these festivals have solely supported our work here in Maine.

We have educated many as to the folly of prohibition and enlightened the public to the aspect of medical marijuana which enabled Maine citizens to make an informed decision about medical marijuana when it came time to vote on an initiative to vote on the issue in 1999. Citizens were educated and ready to pass the citizens initiative when presented to them and did so by over 63% of the voters in Maine, even though it was a piece of junk initiative that was brought before the people by Mainers for Medical Rights. This Organization moved into Maine in the middle of 1998, while we were running a petition drive to legalize medical marijuana and disrupted our drive that we had just volunteers to circulating our petition. We were actually doing pretty well with over 23,000 signatures collected, but MMR, by putting many paid petitioners out on the streets to compete and confuse the people as to what was going on, we lost all of our volunteers to their effort. Our petition was way better than the one MMR brought forth, but because they had Big Money behind them from California and beyond, they could afford to buy their way through and did. Yes, we have a medical bill now, but we could have had a good medical law now if MMR had backed our operation instead of ruining it. Now it has to be fixed with another citizens initiative as the legislature has refused to do much of anything to make it a workable law, when they know it is a mess.

During the years of operation, Maine Vocals have been harassed by the police many times at our festivals, and a couple of yrs in 2003 and 2004 they obtained warrants to come onto the property to see if we were violating the Town Mass Gathering Ordinance for having too many people on our site. When they came to count I simply told the crowd to get up and move around and not stay in one place which made it impossible for the cops to count the people. So they left in defeat, and after a couple of years of that and not being able to say that we were in violation of the ordinance, they were not able to get warrants to search since that time. The cops have at times flooded the roads leading to the Farm with cruisers stopping many in hopes to scare off the people, but the people have kept on coming much to the dismay of the authorities who want to stop our activism and mission of re-legalization. They have not flooded the roads with cruisers/cops for some years now as we have a smaller crowd coming but is at capacity for Hempstock and Harvest Fest, with the other shows catching up to them with larger crowds each year and all will be at capacity before long.

In 2004 I was busted for 2 trafficking charges and cultivation, which they aggravated because of a former marijuana bust, but I was legally growing and in possession of medical marijuana for patients who I was helping with legal doctors paper-work, notarized by a notary to be legal documents. This case is now on its way to the Supreme Court of Maine, which I am confident I will prevail. I won by getting a not guilty verdict for the trafficking charges but had admitted to growing the marijuana legally but the jury never considered the legal paperwork, which the law court will. Meanwhile I was busted again for the same thing, this time with less plants and less weed with different patients legal paperwork, which a judge has since determined that the medical paperwork was indeed OK and "the best good faith effort I could offer with the law as hard to follow as it is." he also said in order to continue to provide for the patients when I got out on bail that I would need to have the patients go back to their doctors for an updated medical paper work which I had already done for one of the patients. This has been done, and I am still being kept from providing for my patients who have legally appointed me as their caregiver and since that time I also have been given my medical paperwork from my doctor to be a legal marijuana user but because of the bail I am on I am not able to provide or use marijuana which my doctor sanctioned for me. I am now awaiting a hearing on this issue, and now have a prescription for pain meds that as all know are addicting and a danger to my overall well being which I do not want to use but am trapped by the system.

I am now working on my new court case with a lawyer, Walter McKee, from Augusta. He is on top of it and will do what he can for me while another lawyer from Augusta, Peter Bickerman, is working on my old case that is going to the law court. Both lawyers are considered top notch and will represent me to their best abilities, I trust.

I am now putting together the festivals for the season with the band lists almost complete and Freedom Festival, Hempstock, and Harvest Festival will be in Starks again this year. I will be moving the July and Sept. and a new Harvest Fest. later in Oct on the 17th to a new location in Harmony  on the Carson Hill Road off Rt. 150. It is about 5 miles past Athens, Maine. Locations will be posted here as well as on the
myspace site. It will be well publicized and a map available for both venues.

The events will go on, this is a promise to the People who have helped and worked so hard in the past to support our efforts, and to you, the public, who enjoy and love our events, as well as your support for legalization in Maine. Meanwhile our legalization efforts will continue as we are ready to launch a full legalization drive for the great state of Maine, and also one to fix the medical marijuana law in Maine that has needed an overhaul since it was first adopted in 1999 with so many problems to begin with, it is virtually unusable to the public unless you are ready as I was to be dragged through the system, harassed and persecuted to scare people into submission. We will be ready to launch the petition drives in approximately 3 weeks. We have over 60 people signed up to collect signatures already with less than one week of advertising for help, which is very good. Anyone that wants to help is encouraged to contact us at 207-696-4444

Thanks everyone for your support.

Dirigo,

Don Christen
Founder, Maine Vocals
207.696.4444