Why Congress Outlawed the Hemp Plant
On a hot Friday afternoon on
The
cannabis/hemp plant came in two versions. The first version was industrial
hemp, a plant with a long history of commercial use, and a very low THC
content. The second version was marijuana, the same plant with a much higher
THC content. THC is the psychoactive chemical found in the blossoms and upper
leaves and used throughout history as an intoxicant and a remedy for treating a
number of health problems.
Drug Commissioner Harry J. Anslinger, head of the FBN (Federal Bureau of Narcotics) first
introduced the bill into committee hearings for review. The hearings, which
should have gone on for days, lasted two
hours.
Anslinger told the committee, "Marihuana is an addictive drug which produces in
its users, insanity, criminality, and death." Anslinger chose the Mexican word
"marihuana," because the committee did
not know that marihuana was the same plant grown in this country for more than
three centuries and prescribed by doctors in a form called cannabis extract.
The first testimony came from a
pharmacologist who had injected himself and 300 dogs with
what he called the "active ingredient" in marihuana. Two of the 300
dogs died when he injected this crude substance into their brains. The
testimony raised eyebrows because the true active ingredient,
tetrahydrocannabinol, had not yet undergo extraction and would not do so until
years later, in
After the pharmacologist completed
his expert testimony, Dr. William C. Woodward, a lawyer and chief counsel for
the American Medical Association testified that "The American Medical Association knows of no evidence
that marijuana is a dangerous drug."
This statement prompted one of the
committee members to remark, "Doctor, if you can't say something good
about what we are trying to do, why don't you go home?"
Another member added, "Doctor,
if you haven't got something better to say than that, we are sick of hearing
you."
These words reveal a pre-existing
hostility between the AMA and
The bill to ban the cannabis plant
from American soil passed easily in the committee and moved on to the House of
Representatives (Congress). It landed on the Speakers Platform before a limited
number of Congressional Representatives that listened in the stifling heat to
Sam Rayburn read the proposal and call for a debate. The debate that followed
consisted of a single man, a Republican from
Speaker Rayburn replied, "I don't know. It has something to do with
something called marihuana. I think it's a narcotic of some kind."
The same man asked if the AMA
supported the bill.
In response to the question, a
member of the committee that had criticized Dr.Woodward and sent the bill to
Congress leaped to his feet and shouted, "Their
Doctor Wentworth came down here. They supported this bill 100 percent!"
This spurious statement ended further
questions, and the vote began. There was no recorded vote on the bill; instead,
legislators walked past this point or that point on the floor to indicate a yes
or no vote.
Based on Anslinger's deliberate
lies and the false statement from the hostile committee member, Congress passed
the bill with no debate. The bill was on the floor for a
remarkable 92 seconds before it became Federal Law. This
new prohibition happened just four years after Congress repealed alcohol
prohibition.
The new law required a $1.00 tax be
paid by anyone possessing or growing cannabis and came under the jurisdiction
of the Treasury Department. Failure to pay the tax could result in a fine of up
to $2000 and five years' imprisonment. When farmers who wished to continue
growing hemp approached the Treasury Dept for a license they quickly discovered
the Treasury Department would not issue a
license. The new tax
law had effectively outlawed hemp
The FBN under Commissioner
Anslinger and later its predecessor, the DEA, received the authority from
Congress to arrest over ninety million Americans over the next seventy
years because they grew or possessed the cannabis plant without a license. Twenty million went to prison.
In 1972, a paranoid Richard Nixon
dismissed his own panel of experts, the Shafer Commission, (which recommended
immediate decriminalization of marijuana) and declared war on pot smokers. He
convinced Congress to authorize the building of the largest prison system in
the world.
Today the hemp plant remains at the top of the
DEA’s list of dangerous addictive drugs, next to heroin.
For more information or to help
change the law, visit www.leap.com (Law Enforcement Against
Prohibition).
Source: "History of the Non-Medical Use of
Drugs in the
Schaffer Library www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/History/white1.htm
James Wiley
415-453-8715
Updated May 2011