CANNABIS CULTURE – High Times magazine presented marijuana activist Marc Emery with the Lester Grinspoon Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam.

Known as the Prince of Pot in his hometown of Vancouver and around the world, Marc Emery has devoted his life – five years of it behind bars – to the cause of legalizing marijuana and ending the War on Drugs, which he sees as a war on people.

Read Marc Emery’s blog on Cannabis Culture.

Marc and his wife Jodie joined legendary stoner Tommy Chong on stage at the 27th High Times Cannabis Cup on Thursday, November 27, in front of a crowd of hundreds at the Melkweg in Amsterdam.

Watch video of the award presentation at the High Times Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam:

From High Times:

Marc Emery began his cannabis activism in 1990, when he launched a campaign to challenge Canada’s 1987 ban on books and magazines about marijuana – in particular, HIGH TIMES magazine. (It also banned bongs, pipes and all smoking devices.) By 1995, Emery had achieved that early goal; pot books and magazines were made legal. But Marc is most famous for starting a political, capitalist cannabis movement across Canada. In 1994, he began selling cannabis seeds as a fundraising tool, which allowed him donate $5 million to ballot initiatives, lawsuits against the US federal government, Canadian Supreme Court challenges and a huge array of campaigns. Marc was publisher of Cannabis Culture magazine from 1994 to 2009. He says he was greatly influenced by Ayn Rand and the late Jack Herer.

He has been arrested 28 times for pot-related offenses, raided 5 times, and has been jailed or imprisoned 23 times. This past August, Marc was released from a US federal prison after serving a 5-year sentence for selling seeds. In a US court, he agreed that he had distributed 3 million seeds to the US from 1995-2005. Marc’s famous quote is “Plant the Seeds of Freedom, Overgrow the Government.” He has lived those words. We salute him for his activism and are honored to present him with the Lester Grinspoon Lifetime Achievement Award.

See the gallery of photos from the Cannabis Cup award ceremony by CC Editor Jeremiah Vandermeer:

See more photos and video from Cannabis Culture’s trip to Amsterdam.