Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

A Budding Movement

A+Budding+Movement
MICHELLE XU/THE HOYA
MICHELLE XU/THE HOYA

The headline, although tucked deep within the Oct. 1, 1936 edition of The Washington Post, blared with the frantic, sensationalist urgency of a piece reporting on the apocalypse.

“STUDENTS STAGE ORGIES INDUCED BY MARIHUANA; DISTRICT AND U.S. POWERLESS TO SUPPRESS WEED”

Although nearly every state government had passed laws harshly regulating the trafficking of marijuana, no federal law existed that dealt with the drug and the problems supposedly stemming from it — meaning that Washington, D.C., still 37 years away from home rule, was only protected from the terrors of “the green goddess” by lax federal pharmaceutical regulations. A drug that had only recently been associated exclusively with immigrants was now being consumed by the “sons and daughters of respectable Washington families,” and there was little D.C. law enforcement could do about it.

Then, the District was one of the last places in America to adopt marijuana prohibition laws; today, it is one of the first to take steps to repeal them. If Ballot Initiative 71 passes with a majority on Nov. 4 and Congress doesn’t prevent its implementation, Washington, D.C., will be the first area on the East Coast to legalize marijuana possession. The complex history of marijuana in D.C., inexorably linked to the federal government, may be the turning point in ending the drug’s century-long prohibition in the United States.

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Grander, more conspiratorial arguments exist about the primary motivating force behind marijuana prohibition, the most popular being that marijuana demonization was engineered by industrial robber barons afraid of the burgeoning hemp industry. But, the man most responsible for federal marijuana prohibition — and for the characterizations of the drug that have kept this prohibition afloat for almost a century — was undoubtedly Harry Anslinger, the inaugural and long-serving commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics.

The bureau, which was created in 1930, dealt mostly with opiates during its initial years. But because marijuana was not classified as a narcotic on the federal level, the FBN could only aid state and municipal law enforcement in planning and carrying out raids.

This changed in 1937, when the Marijuana Tax Act that was drafted by the bureau was passed by Congress and made into law. Because the FBN operated as a division of the Treasury, it used the federal government’s power to tax as its primary weapon. All producers, importers and users of the drug were required to register with the federal government, pay an annual fee and keep detailed records of sales logs in order to allow for further taxation. These burdens weren’t just cumbersome and expensive — they could be used as proof of breaking state narcotics law. Thus, marijuana was essentially made illegal on the federal level.

When compared to the modern perception of marijuana, the language used by both Anslinger and the media in the events surrounding the bill’s passage sounds extreme and overwrought.

“The deleterious, even vicious, qualities of the drug,” Anslinger said in a congressional hearing on the Marijuana Tax Act, “render it highly dangerous to the mind and body upon which it operates to destroy the will, cause one to lose the power of connected thought, producing imaginary delectable situations and gradually weakening the physical powers. Its use frequently leads to insanity.”

A contemporary editorial in The Washington Post in support of the bill’s passage, entitled “The Marijuana Menace,” extended Anslinger’s argument to American society at large.

“It is time to wipe out the evil before its potentialities for national degeneracy become more apparent,” the editorial board wrote on April 17, 1937.

The most popular motivation for passage, which is still found in the rhetoric of those opposed to legalization, was that marijuana was increasingly exposed to children, making them more likely to use other narcotics in the future. Rep. Robert Doughton (D-N.C.), who sponsored the Marijuana Tax Act, singled out the idea that marijuana was especially appealing to the young as the main reason for the necessity of federal prohibition.

“While the traffic in narcotics always has been restricted primarily to adults,” Doughton told The Washington Post when he introduced the bill in 1937, “marihuana is attacking children of high-school age.”

Lurid tales of “heroin rings” exposing high school students to marijuana and then to more addictive drugs were narratives frequently pushed by the FBN. A 1951 story in The Washington Post, which was admittedly sourced almost entirely by one of Anslinger’s bureau officials, relayed how this was done.

“Although chances are a teenager started ‘joy clubbing’ with marihuana,” journalists Wendy and Everett Martin wrote, “he soon turns to heroin, or ‘H,’ or ‘horse.’ He hears about the bigger kicks it affords. Almost always a pusher gives him a cap for a ‘trial run.’” The story goes on to describe the teenagers’ downfall into theft, violence, sexual promiscuity and prostitution, painting this degradation as an inevitable yet common occurrence.

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Today, those arguing against marijuana legalization don’t point to any sort of resulting hysteria. Kevin Sabet, a former White House adviser under President Obama, leads the anti-legalization organization Project SAM, or Smart Approaches to Marijuana. Some of the arguments that are cited by the organization echo those made by Harry Anslinger — that marijuana stunts the brain development of children and can lead to mental illness if consumed often enough — but others consider more modern concerns.

Although Project SAM recognizes the potential medical benefits of marijuana, he argues that smoking marijuana is not an appropriate way to yield its positive effects, as the dispensaries that sell it blur the line between recreational and medical use. Further, Sabet warns against a commercialized marijuana industry similar to Big Tobacco, which knowingly spread falsehoods about tobacco’s effects in order to keep consumption high. (Sabet could not be reached for comment.)

More involved in D.C.’s anti-legalization efforts has been Two Is Enough. The organization argues that two legalized drugs — alcohol and tobacco — have had a negative societal impact, and the addition of a third would only cause more problems.

“The test to see what is going to happen is when we look at two legalized drugs already, alcohol and tobacco, and the use of these is out of control for many areas,” Two Is Enough Founder Will Jones III said.

While Sabet and Two Is Enough speak less about the anatomical effects of marijuana consumption and more about its societal effects, legalization advocates take a more wide-angled approach concerning why prohibition should be lifted.

“This is not about getting high,” said Adam Eidinger, the chairman of the D.C. Cannabis Campaign, which submitted the ballot initiative and has been the primary group campaigning for its passage.

Eidinger decries how marijuana is viewed not only by anti-legalization advocates but also by those who turgidly support the initiative’s passage yet advocate for extremely strict regulation similar to that in Minnesota, where smoking medical marijuana is considered a felony.

“When marijuana is regulated more strictly than alcohol,” Eidinger said, “that’s political — that’s not based on science, not based on data.”

Eidinger primarily sees marijuana legalization as an issue of civil rights and civil liberties, which is fitting given his background as an activist who — by his own count — has been arrested 16 different times for various causes. The official campaign for the initiative began with a protest in front of the D.C. Superior Courthouse a year and a half ago. Eidinger chose this location because he views the criminal justice system as the primary area in which the consequences of marijuana prohibition have played out.

Eidinger’s arguments focus less on the taxation and business opportunities provided by legalization — although he himself was a co-owner of the now-closed hemp clothing store Capitol Hemp — and more on the inanity of singling out marijuana possession and personal use from that of comparable drugs like alcohol and caffeine.

“We distinguish the basic right of personal possession, of home cultivation, the right to buy a smoking device and of the right to give it away to your friends who are of age,” Eidinger said. “The idea that you can’t share it with anyone — people share stuff. People share coffee.”

“I’d like to see it sold in Whole Foods, to be honest,” he added.

Eidinger also mentioned the racial disparities in drug arrests, which are especially stark in Washington, D.C., as a reason for legalization. The American Civil Liberties Union found that in 2010, blacks in D.C. were eight times more likely to be arrested for marijuana-related crimes than whites, despite essentially equal usage rates.

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Despite some regrets and concerns about the initiative’s language — he is unsure if the D.C. City Council will make possession legal for people in the District who are not residents, and he regrets making the legal age of possession 21 instead of 18 — Eidinger is optimistic about and excited for Ballot Initiative 71’s passage.

“We aren’t just going to win — whether we win by 65 percent or 75 percent is the question,” he said. “We want to win with at least 70 percent of the vote.”

His confidence certainly isn’t unfounded: Last month, an NBC4 poll revealed that 65 percent of likely voters would vote “Yes” on the initiative. But, the optimism is surprising when looked at within a historical context, where earlier attempts to chip away at marijuana prohibition have been fraught with conflict.

In 1998, the city passed Ballot Initiative 59, which legalized medical marijuana in the District by a landslide. However, Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) introduced and passed an amendment that would cut off funding to D.C. if that year’s District of Columbia Appropriations Act went on the books. It took 12 years — and, ironically, an effort lobbied for by the now-libertarian Barr — for Congress to repeal the amendment, and the City Council passed a law legalizing medical marijuana in 2010.

The provisions, however, were uniquely strict. The list of diseases that qualified one for medical marijuana treatment were limited to cancer, HIV/AIDS, glaucoma, intense muscle spasms and other diseases treated by chemotherapy or radiation; potential patients first needed to register with the city’s health department and doctors had much less freedom to prescribe the treatment.

In the past year, however, barriers to accessing marijuana have been eliminated at a rapid pace. This spring, the District decriminalized the drug, meaning that anyone caught possessing an ounce or less of marijuana would only have it confiscated and be given a $25 fine. Then, the D.C. City Council struck down the small list of conditions “approved” to be treated with medical marijuana, allowing doctors to prescribe it whenever they felt it necessary.

Therefore, the most recent data show that the number of patients registered to receive medical marijuana in the District has nearly doubled, from 738 to 1,362, according to the D.C. Department of Health. Moreover, Initiative 71, which would legalize limited possession and cultivation of marijuana, was added to the Nov. 4 ballot with 58,000 signatures — more than double the 22,373 required.

Eidinger is also optimistic that marijuana legalization is an issue that will bring young people to the voter registration booths and polls, and that neither party in Congress, not looking to isolate a future voting pool, will organize an effort to repeal the law during its mandatory, 30-day Congressional review period — therefore avoiding the delay that plagued the District’s medical marijuana implementation.

“It’s an issue that’s becoming the third rail of politics,” he said.

But because Washington, D.C., has no federal representation and inevitably votes Democrat in the presidential election, the issue may not be enough to bring the amount of young people, such as the District’s sizable population of college students, to register to vote in D.C., especially considering that D.C. has same-day registration.

While Lauren Robin (COL ’18) is both aware of and supports Initiative 71, she is not going to vote in the District on Nov. 4.

“I’m still going to vote in my home state of Connecticut because they actually have representatives, which is more important to me than this issue,” she said.

Lucas Brooks (COL ’16) is not interested enough in D.C. politics to switch his registration.

“I’ll vote,” he said, “but I’ll do it at home in California because I care more about California than D.C.”

Svitlana Mykulynska (SFS ’17), on the other hand, will vote — and vote “Yes” — on the issue, despite not hailing from the area.

“I’ll probably vote in D.C. instead of my home state because I live here now, don’t I,” she said.

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If the ballot initiative passes, it is unlikely that The Washington Post will run pieces on increased student orgies or hospitalization in psyche wards, as it did in the 1930s. Instead of focusing on the drug’s scandalous effects, the main story of marijuana in 2014 is that if the initiative passes, the federal government will have to confront its drug policy directly, something that it had left up to the states beforehand. The Congressional review period for the decriminalization law this summer saw resistance to the bill from just one representative, Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), who later withdrew the bill that was meant to prevent the practice. What happens on the Hill in the 30 days after Nov. 4 if the initiative passes may be a harbinger of national drug policy for decades to come, and if prohibition is curbed in the District, it may be on its way out across the nation.

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