ALSTEAD, New Hampshire — A longtime labor activist who successfully sued the state of New Hampshire to get access to medical marijuana has died.
Monday afternoon, the New Hampshire chapter of the AFL-CIO confirmed Linda Horan’s death.
Horan, 64, of Alstead had late-stage lung cancer.
She was first New Hampshire resident to be issued a medical marijuana card late last year, after winning a lawsuit against the state’s Department of Health and Human Services.
New Hampshire legislators legalized medical marijuana about two years ago, but Granite State dispensaries won’t open until next year, and the state health department wanted to delay sending out ID cards to patients until then.
Horan used her card to pick up her first dose of the drug in Maine last month.
“In many ways she had a tenacious spirit. She was not going to die until she forced the state of New Hampshire to give her the medicine she was entitled to,” state Rep. Robert Cushing, D-Hampton, said Monday afternoon. “She did that in a way that was kind of an inspiration and an example of Linda wanting to give meaning to her life to the very end, and help others to the very end.”
Cushing assisted Horan in her fight to get access to medical marijuana.
Glenn Brackett, president of the state’s AFL-CIO chapter, said he learned of Horan’s passing Monday morning from a mutual friend.
“Linda was a very strong person. She never met a cause she wouldn’t rally to,” he said.
He had known Horan for about 30 years, and she was a very loving, tenacious and compassionate person who believed workers deserved a place at the table, he said.
“She’s one of those people who literally wore her heart on her sleeve,” Brackett said. “It’s a great loss to the labor movement. They don’t make people like Linda every day.”
Horan was a lifelong member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2320, based in Manchester, New Hampshire. The local union’s business manager, Steve W. Soule, said a member of Horan’s family contacted the office this morning to share the news of her death.
Soule said Horan touched so many lives and was a fearless leader. He said he’ll always remember her as a passionate advocate for the rights of people in the labor movement.
“She had no hesitation to speak to what other people felt but lacked the courage to say,” said Soule, who first met Horan in 1997. “She spoke truth to power from the first day I met her until the process that was her last fight on this earth.”
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