Hemp for victory - history of the hemp and paper industries

If you love trees, you ought to know about the reasons why hemp is no longer grown for paper in the US. I'm not a big believer in conspiracy theories, but the story of the suppression of hemp is one that deserves to be more widely known.

Alan Mason is a writer, philospher, and student of shamanic traditions. He and his wife Jacqui are both associate editors and writers for Psychedelic Illuminations, a quarterly magazine of "scientific information, philosophical discussions, literacy and artistic works, hard news, and intelligent commentary relating to the modern and traditional uses of consciousness-altering plants and chemicals for personal, spiritual, and cultural growth and change."

What is hemp? It depends on whom you talk to. If you talk to the person on the street he may not be able to tell you, but there is a fair chance that he, or someone he knows, has smoked it as marijuana.

If you ask folk doctors in most countries, it is the plant that provides healing salves, antibiotics, childbirth aids, and dozens, of other medicinals. To the historian, it is the hardy, cheaply grown plant that provided the best material for rope and sail for hundreds of years (the word "canvas" comes from cannabis), and was the subject of the first "drug" laws in England and the Colonies - laws that required farmers to grow the plant. To the AIDS or cancer patient, it is the plant that combats nausea and appetite loss. To the nutritionist, it has a seed second only to soybeans in nutritional value, and is a source of cooking oil and vitamin supplements. To the paper or cloth manufacturer, it is the plant that provided much of our paper and clothing for hundreds of years and produces four times more fiber per acre than trees, fiber that can even be made into particle-board for building. To the environmentalist, it is the plant that could vastly slow the deforestation of the planet, restore land robbed of nutrients by other crops, prevent erosion, provide biomass and other low-pollution fuels, and vastly reduce our need for pesticides in the process. Unfortunately, to most people in positions of power in this country, it is a useless plant with no economic or medicinal value.

If you don't readily recognize the word "hemp," you can thank William Randolph Hearst. Up until the 1920s most Americans knew marijuana as hemp or cannabis, and the plant was an accepted part of everyday life in the US. Hearst started using the Mexican slang term "marijuana" in his racist campaign against Mexicans that began around the time of the Spanish-American War in 1898. This campaign, which later expanded to include blacks, Chinese, and other minorities, began when Pancho Villa seized thousands of acres of Hearst's paper-producing timberland in Mexico. By referring to the well-known and accepted hemp plant as marijuana, portraying it as a drug that causes minorities to rob, rape, murder, and generally disrespect their betters, Hearst created a climate of fear that laid the groundwork for the plans of Harry Anslinger, head of the newly formed Federal Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, and others.

Anslinger pushed the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 through Congress almost unnoticed. Although this law did not actually make hemp illegal, it taxed it at a rate equal to its selling price - a dollar an ounce at the time - and required growers to register with the government. Although representatives of the seed and lubricating-oil industries, as well as the American Medical Association (!), protested the law, their protests went unheard in the face of Anslinger's testimony - which consisted primarily of reading baseless articles from Hearst's newspapers. In October of 1937 the new Prohibition went into effect disguised as a tax law.

The two other members of this Gang of Four were Andrew Mellon (Herbert Hoover's treasury secretary, Harry Anslinger's uncle-in-law, and banker) and the DuPont Corporation - a major producer of petrochemicals used in the production of paper, lubricating oils, and pesticides. While the full extent of this conspiracy may never be known, its result was the destruction of industries that had provided jobs and valuable products since the Colonies were first founded.

The destruction of the hemp industry did, however, help fuel another growth industry. The passage of the Marijuana Tax Act and the formation of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics spawned our present-day War on Drugs and led to the creation of sprawling government drug enforcement bureaucracies and numberless public and private social agencies and anti-drug groups, all dedicated to the eradication of "drug abuse" - i.e., any illegal drug use regardless of its impact on the user. They created vast criminal cartels whose profits run in the billions of dollars, as well as a huge new class of victimless criminals. These laws could even be said to have created a new addiction: that of law enforcement agencies to the funds generated by property forfeiture in times of shrinking public budgets. The lessons of Prohibition were apparently host on those who tried, and are still trying, to stamp out the use of an innocuous drug which, according to all available information, has never directly caused anyone's death - and which could play a major role in saving the earth's environment and dwindling resources.

One result of these laws is that our prisons are occupied to a large extent (some estimates say upwards of 60 percent) by people whose crimes are "drug-related." Information is scarce as to how many of these are major hard-drug dealers and how many of them are your average citizen caught smoking hemp. However, given that tens of millions of Americans have smoked hemp, and that the number of users of hard drugs is fairly small in comparison, one can reasonably assume that many prisoners are in jail for simple possession of hemp. Mandatory sentencing laws enacted in the most recent wave of anti-drug hysteria have resulted in violent offenders being released while hemp smokers and other nonviolent drug offenders stay imprisoned. The reversal of these laws could do much toward reducing our local, state, and federal budget deficits. For example, a recent informal survey by the Orange County Hemp Council in Orange County, California, indicated that by releasing all current hemp prisoners, and ending enforcement of anti-hemp laws, the county could probably wipe out its budget deficit.

The situation is not without hope. In recent years, major political figures on the right as well as the left have spoken out against the insanity of the War on Drugs and the criminalization of drug use. Over fifty federal judges are now refusing to hear drug cases (in large part, because of the unfairness of the mandatory sentencing laws), and some judges are speaking publicly in favor of decriminalization or outright legalization. Janet Reno, U.S. Attorney General, has stated that she favors educating and treating drug offenders over imprisoning them. Most importantly, some courageous individuals have uncovered and publicized the history of hemp as a planet with thousands of environmentally friendly uses. Without even considering the economic and social benefits of decriminalizing or legalizing recreational hemp use, the economic benefits of a revitalized hemp industry would be immense. These benefits can be debated without consideration of the legalization issue, as hemp grown for non-smoking purposes is so weak as to be virtually useless as a drug. It is not unreasonable to refer to hemp, in the words of hemp advocate Jack Herer, as the plant that can save the world.

COPYRIGHT 1993 Point Foundation
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group