America 's War On Drugs

“Over 40 year ago president nixon, Declared Drug abuse public enemy number one, starting an unprecedented global Campaign, the war on drug.

In order to spread lies about marijuana use, various agencies released propaganda films, most notable of these films is “Reefer Madness”. In this film, high school students are lured into using marijuana, which leads the students to commit murder, rape, suicide, and an overall decent into madness. Despite the strong use of propaganda, marijuana use saw an upward trend between the 1950’s and the 1960’s. Use of marijuana had spread to the white upper and middle classes by the 1960’s, partially changing the negative connotations attached to marijuana use. The drug was used by these middle and upper class whites to rebel against the older generation’s way of thinking. Many teens were introduced to marijuana use in college, where various other counter-culture ideas were being expounded. While the use of marijuana experienced a rise since the 1800’s to the middle of the 20th century, use of the drug saw a strong downward trend in the 1970’s through the early 1990’s, in part due to the strongest

Cannabis began being outlawed all across the U.S. during the 1900’s and has remained illegal ever since, until recent years when states began legalizing it (huffpost.com). Although many people believe that the reason behind the prohibition of cannabis was based on genuine concern for the possible consequences it may have on the well-being of people if it remained accessible to all, the truth is that the drive behind the U.S.’s prohibition of cannabis was founded on racism. During the early 1900’s cannabis was considered an “ethnic drug” due to the fact that many Mexican immigrants smoked the plant (huffpost.com). With the tension in Western states regarding the migration of Mexicans into the states, laws concerning the use regulation of

Marijuana was in the United States Pharmacopeia from 1850 until 1942 and was prescribed to patients for various conditions including labor pains, nausea and rheumatism. During the 1850’s up to the 1930’s it was a very popular intoxicant. A movement conducted in the 1930’s by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotics (presently the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs) fought to make marijuana appear to be an Addicting and powerful substance that would lead

In the past forty years, the United States has spent over $2.5 trillion dollars funding enforcement and prevention in the fight against drug use in America (Suddath). Despite the efforts made towards cracking down on drug smugglers, growers, and suppliers, statistics show that addiction rates have remained unchanged and the number of people using illegal drugs is increasing daily (Sledge). Regardless of attempts to stem the supply of drugs, the measure and quality of drugs goes up while the price goes down (Koebler). Now with the world’s highest incarceration rates and greatest illegal drug consumption (Sledge), the United States proves that the “war on drugs” is a war that is not being won.

“Over 40 year ago president nixon, Declared Drug abuse public enemy number one, starting an unprecedented global Campaign, the war on drug.

Throughout history, the drug war has always targeted minority groups. “At the root of the drug-prohibition movement in the United States is race, which is the driving force behind the first laws criminalizing drug use, which first appeared as early as the 1870s (Cohen, 56)”. There were many drug laws that targeted minority groups such as the marijuana ban of 1930s that criminalized Mexican migrant farm workers and in the Jim Crow South, reformist wanted to wage war on the Negro cocaine feign so they used African Americans as a scapegoat while they overlooked southern white women who were a bigger problem for the drug epidemic (Cohen, 57). Instead of tackling the root of the drug problem they passed the blame to struggling minority groups within the United States.

Back in the 1900’s when there was a large immigration influx of Mexicans into the U.S., citizens not only saw there was an influx of their customs. This included the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes (Burnett and Reiman, 2014). What most Americans didn’t realize is that it is the same as what they knew as cannabis, which had been used in many medicines for years and was found in may American households. The U.S. had been known to control immigrants by having an excuse to search and deport certain races by outlawing the use of their traditional medicinal drugs, like had been done with Chinese immigrants and the use of opium in San Francisco (Burnett and Reiman, 2014). Texas adopted this way of thought by using marijuana to control Mexican immigrants. Claims were made that marijuana was able to “cause men of color to become violent and solicit sex from white women” (Burnett and Reiman, 2014). From accusation like this, the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 came into being and

Ever since marijuana’s introduction to the United States of America in 1611, controversy of the use and legalization of the claimed-to-be Schedule I drug spread around the nation. While few selective states currently allow marijuana’s production and distribution, the remaining states still skepticize the harmlessness and usefulness of this particular drug; therefore, it remains illegal in the majority of the nation. The government officials and citizens of the opposing states believe the drug creates a threat to citizens due to its “overly-harmful” effects mentally and physically and offers no alternate purposes but creating troublesome addicts hazardous to society; however, they are rather misinformed about marijuana’s abilities. While

The current policy in use by the United States concerning illegal drugs is both outdated and unfair. This so-called war on drugs is a deeply rooted campaign of prohibition and unfair sentencing that is very controversial and has been debated for many years. The war on drugs is designed so that it will never end. This current drug was has very little impact on the overall supply of prohibited drugs and its impact on demand seems non-existent. United States’ taxpayers are spending billions of dollars on this failure of policy. They are spending billions to incarcerate drug users instead offering drug treatment which could help lower demand. Legalizing illicit would lower abuse and deaths from use and could have a positive economic impact on the United States. Certain industries are making massive sums of money by capitalizing on the drug war.

The inception of cannabis prohibition in the United States began no more than a century ago. During the colonization of the free nation, the consumption, production, and sale of cannabis was legal due to high reliance on hemp at the time. By the close of the nineteenth century cannabis became, alongside tobacco and cotton, one of the leading crops produced in the Americas. During this time physicians often prescribed cannabis for medical, however, after a rise in opiate addiction following the Civil War, cannabis fell under the same fate as many other commonly stigmatized drugs such as heroin and cocaine. Moreover, early restrictions on cannabis are documented as being under the guise of federal drug regulatory objectives backed with discriminatory

William Randolph Hearst began a smear campaign against hemp in the 1920s and 1930s. Through the use of ‘yellow journalism’ Hearst manufactured a new threat to America in a campaign to have hemp outlawed. “For example, a story of a car accident in which a “marijuana cigarette” was found would dominate the headlines for weeks, while alcohol-related car accidents (which outnumbered marijuana-connected accidents by more than 10,000 to 1) made only the back pages.” (Herer Chap 4) “From 1910 to 1920, Hearst’s newspapers would claim that the majority of incidents in which blacks were said to have raped white women, could be traced directly to cocaine. This continued for 10 years until

Marijuana, a Schedule I, classified drug is one of America’s most controversial drugs. Many people are against marijuana because it legally considered a drug and many people support marijuana because of its reported use for preventing and treating diseases. Personally, I believe that marijuana should be used for medical purposes. My opinion, however, comes primarily from what I have observed through brief news reports and what I have been told from people who has used the drug before. I never really took the time and did any educational research on the drug myself. Hopefully, after I complete this essay, I will have a better understanding of the drug and I would

In 2009 1,663,582 people were arrested for non-violent drug charges. These people’s lives are now forever changed because of a mistake they made. This mistake is continually made every single day and Americans are being punished in extreme ways for a non violent crime. The United States needs to decimalize all drugs because the drug war is costly, causes high incarceration rates, and isn’t effective as European drug solutions.

In less than forty years the most important man in the Western world has gone from declaring marijuana the most dangerous drug to openly discussing its possible rescheduling. The argument can be made that Reagan was far more conservative than Obama, however it is more likely that this change is due to the shift in public perception on the substance. There are currently 23 states with laws allowing for medical use of cannabis, and four states who allow for recreational use. A 1969 Gallup poll found 4% of respondents reportedly tried marijuana in their life. In 2013 that number rose to 38%. Youth rates have varied some recent years however the average 30 day use rate is around 12%. There are a variety of factors that have been discussed as possible reasons for this increase in marijuana use. This paper explores potential causes for the increase in marijuana use and change in public perception about the drug in the past fifty years.