History of United States drug prohibition
Statutes regulating the sale of narcotics had been passed by several state governments, and opium smoking was outlawed in numerous American municipalities, though these legislation were "only sporadically enforced".
Poison laws generally either required labels on the packaging indicating the harmful effects of the drugs or prohibited sale outside of licensed pharmacies and without a doctor's prescription.
[5] 1913: The American Medical Association created a propaganda department to outlaw health fraud and quackery.
1914: The first recorded instance of the United States enacting a ban on the domestic distribution of drugs is the Harrison Narcotic Act[7] of 1914.
[8] 1919: Alcohol prohibition in the U.S. first appeared under numerous provincial bans and was eventually codified under a federal constitutional amendment in 1919, having been approved by 36 of the 48 U.S. states.
1932: Democrat Franklin Roosevelt ran for President of the United States promising repeal of federal laws of Prohibition of alcohol.
[11] This law, however, was something of a "Catch-22", as obtaining a tax stamp required individuals to first present their goods, which was an action tantamount to confession.
This act was passed by Congress on the basis of testimony and public perception that marijuana caused insanity, criminality, and death.
[14] During the Laotian Civil War, Long Tieng served as a town and airbase operated by the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States.
Located at the center of hippie culture in the Haight-Ashbury, it offered drugs such as LSD, the use of which was believed to expand one's consciousness.
The CSA is the federal U.S. drug policy under which the manufacture, importation, possession, use and distribution of certain substances is regulated.
During the Nixon era, for the only time in the history of the war on drugs, the majority of funding goes towards treatment, rather than law enforcement.
In May, 1971 Congressmen Robert Steele (R-CT) and Morgan Murphy (D-IL) released a report on the growing heroin epidemic among U.S. servicemen in Vietnam.
[27] 1993: Joycelyn Elders, the Surgeon General, said that the legalization of drugs "should be studied", causing a stir among opponents.
Using retrospective data, researchers in several studies found that drug courts reduced recidivism among program participants in contrast to comparable probationers between 12% and 40%.
[37] 2012: Colorado and Washington (state) passed laws to legalize the consumption, possession, and sale of marijuana.
2014: Alaska, Minnesota and Oregon passed laws to legalize the consumption, possession, and sale of marijuana.
