U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions' belief that "good people don't smoke marijuana" isn't just archaic. It's fueling what could become an all-out assault by the Justice Department to close dispensaries and turn back the marijuana clock in states that have legalized its recreational use.

And what of the many thousands of sick people who use medical marijuana?

What of the children who can't control their seizures with prescription medicine, but find relief in a non-smokable, non-euphoric form of cannabis?

What of veterans coping with post traumatic stress disorder, who find themselves at legal odds with the nation they defended?

What of people suffering from a wasting syndrome, the side effects of chemotherapy, or the sight-robbing effects of glaucoma?

Are they bad people?

The American people know the answer to this. By huge margins (94 percent, in a recent Quinnipiac poll) they support legalization of medical marijuana, and by lesser but significant majorities (61 percent, in a recent CBS poll), for recreational use. The numbers go higher when pollsters ask if the federal government should force Colorado, Washington, California and other states to abandon their regulated pot programs.

Sessions wants to enforce the federal law that recognizes marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug, on a par with heroin and cocaine. Last week it was disclosed that he has medical marijuana in his sights, too.

In a month-old letter made public Monday, Sessions asked Senate and House leaders to revoke the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, a 2014 measure that prohibits the federal government from clamping down on states that passed laws legalizing medical marijuana.

The rationale?

"The (Justice) department must be in a position to use all laws available to combat the transnational drug organizations and dangerous drug traffickers who threaten American lives," Sessions said, noting that medical marijuana use coincides with a deadly drug crisis and what he foresees as an increase in drug-related crime.

This is the point where readers may ask: What is our attorney general smoking?

The addiction/overdose epidemic gripping the nation has everything to do with the supply of prescription painkillers and heroin. Not marijuana. The nation's top law enforcement officer knows that violent crime in the U.S. has been steadily declining for years.

It's fair to ask why Congress hasn't done more to curtail the flow of legal opioid painkillers and make more programs available to treat addiction, to keep drug users out of the criminal court system.

On this issue, states are light-years ahead of Washington -- not just in seeing "what works" in evaluating the curative powers of a weed, but in burying the myths of a failed drug war in trying to get a handle on the opioid crisis.

Pennsylvania and New Jersey have limited, fairly restrictive medical marijuana programs. Both states also have initiated campaigns to counter an opioid plague. On these issues, at least, there is a consensus that transcends deep partisan divides.

Except in the Trump administration. While candidate Donald Trump expressed a willingness to let states do their own thing on marijuana, President Trump seems ready to sign off on a drug war between the federal government and the states.

After he learned of the attorney general's intent, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf fired off a letter to Sessions, defending Pennsylvania's medical marijuana program and threatening to sue if the federal government intervenes.

Regardless of what anyone thinks about marijuana, undoing the advances on legalization -- as decided by voters and legislatures -- is an invitation to accelerate a cultural war already cleaving the nation. In the case of medical marijuana, it would be an act of cruelty.

Members of Congress need to uphold the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, keep Uncle Sam out of the states' marijuana reforms -- and let the weight of history and millions of ruined lives provide the direction.