Chapter 14 - Sociopolitical History of Marijuana and America’s War on Drugs

Summary

Although California is seen as a cradle of racial diversity and liberal marijuana politics today, it was once a cradle of racism and anti-marijuana legislation. In a surge of progressive social activism beginning in the 1890’s, California prohibited nonprescription opium, morphine and cocaine in 1907, seven years before the US Congress restricted narcotics, and prohibited marijuana in 1911. Racial prejudice against immigrants into the American southwest from Mexico was inflamed by politicians and yellow journalism’s lurid accounts of the marijuana crimes they brought. By 1930, 60% of drug arrests in Los Angeles were for marijuana. With the end of alcohol prohibition in 1933, Harry Anslinger turned the Federal Bureau of Narcotics’ attention to demonizing and suppressing marijuana. America’s drug policy took a crucial turn into a political cul-de-sac in 1971 when President Nixon declared his War on Drugs. In 1981, the War on Drugs mutated into a War on Drug Users when President Reagan acknowledged that fighting the supply side of the drug war was failing. The rate of incarceration spiraled to 25% of the world’s prison population, with a 13:1 bias against African Americans. Just as alcohol prohibition had ended with individual states withdrawal of support for enforcement, California was about to challenge the War on Drugs as a failure.