The ruling
On September 9, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit declined to freeze the Justice Department’s April rescheduling order while the challenges to it play out. The panel was brisk about it: petitioners “have not satisfied the stringent requirements for a stay pending court review.”
The stay request came from the National Drug and Alcohol Screening Association and cannabinoid drug developer MMJ International Holdings. Three separate suits are now consolidated in front of the same court — one led by Smart Approaches to Marijuana and NDASA, one from a coalition of physicians and anti-legalization advocates, and one from the attorneys general of Indiana and Nebraska, after Louisiana withdrew. None of them has been decided. The order simply stays on the books while they are argued.
What the April order actually did
Less than the headlines suggest. Effective April 28, 2026, two categories moved from Schedule I to Schedule III: marijuana inside an FDA-approved drug product, and marijuana subject to a state medical marijuana license. The rule is explicit that the rest stays put — unlicensed bulk marijuana, marijuana extract, and delta-9-THC material used to make FDA-approved drug products all remain in Schedule I.
To make it immediate, the Acting Attorney General invoked U.S. obligations under the 1961 U.N. Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs rather than going through standard notice-and-comment rulemaking. That shortcut is the whole substance of the lawsuits: not whether marijuana belongs in Schedule III, but whether it could be put there this way.
A separate DEA administrative proceeding is still weighing whether all marijuana should move to Schedule III. That one has its own briefing to finish before the judge recommends anything.
Why South Carolina is watching from the parking lot
Schedule III attaches to marijuana “subject to a state medical marijuana license.” South Carolina doesn’t issue one. NORML’s survey of state law lists South Carolina with only a narrow low-THC, high-CBD provision — no dispensaries, no licensing framework, nothing for the federal order to attach to.
The Compassionate Care Act, S. 53, has sat in the Senate Committee on Medical Affairs since it was read in on January 14, 2025, and has never been reported out. So the reform is real, and locally it changes nothing.
None of this reaches hemp. Hemp lives in a different statute on a different clock, and those dates haven’t moved.
Sources
- Marijuana Moment — Federal Court Rejects Marijuana Opponents’ Request To Block Rescheduling Move
- Federal Register — DOJ/DEA Final Rule 2026-08176, effective April 28, 2026
- NORML — South Carolina Laws & Penalties
- South Carolina Legislature — S. 53, Compassionate Care Act
Educational content, not legal advice. Laws change — verify with official sources.
