"Leni's Law" is now formally a bill.

State Rep. Mike Ball filed the proposal Tuesday on the first day of the 2016 legislative session that would decriminalize the possession of medicinal marijuana oil that has been prescribed by a doctor.

The bill is named for 4-year-old Leni Young, who has significantly reduced her seizures since her family moved to Oregon from Alabama to access cannabidiol (CBD oil).

The bill would permit patients, or their parents or guardians if the patients are minors, to have possession of the oil with up to 3 percent THC - the part of marijuana that provides the psychoactive high - with a doctor's prescription. Even at 3 percent THC, the oil would not yield a high, Ball said.

Currently, the oil is accessible in Alabama only through the Carly's Law study at UAB, which Ball helped push through the legislature two years ago.

Carly's Law, through much negotiation in the State House, eventually passed without dissent in 2014 and was signed into law by Gov. Robert Bentley. Ball said he expects Leni's Law to have a smoother path.

"The difference between when I was doing Carly's Law and Leni's Law - as far as the response I'm getting from legislators and interested parties - it's like daylight and dark," Ball told AL.com. "The folks are very receptive and they understand what this is all about."

Despite the effort to de-criminalize possession of CBD oil, Ball said for significant change to occur, the Drug Enforcement Administration needs to re-classify marijuana as a Schedule 2 drug. It's now a Schedule 1 drug.

Schedule 1 drugs have no medicinal value, according to the DEA. Other Schedule 1 drugs include heroin, LSD and ecstasy.

Ball, R-Madison, said he and Sen. Paul Sanford, R-Huntsville, hope to pass a resolution in the legislature pushing for marijuana to be removed as a Schedule 1 drug.

"Anybody with any common sense and anybody who looks at the evidence available can see that's not true (that marijuana has no medicinal value)," Ball said. "There's some medicinal value to it, which I think is one of the criteria to move from Schedule 1 to Schedule 2.

"I would strongly encourage everybody out there in our federal delegation to find a way to get some help for these people, to make this medicine available to these people who need it."

Re-classifying marijuana would create opportunities for more research, Ball said.

"I'm saying we need to un-handcuff our neurologists and our medical people," he said. "This stuff has potential for things other than just seizures. Seizures are one of the most profound things (that it's helped) but there are many other things that have the potential for help and we need to take the handcuffs off our doctors."