SandScript 2022

One Example of the Hazy History of
the United States’ Drug Policy
Collin Bryant
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“It was the spirit of poetry who reached out and found me as I stood there at the doorway between panic and love” . . .
“To imagine the spirit of poetry is much like imagining the shape and size of the knowing. It is a kind of resurrection
light; it is the tall ancestor spirit who has been with me since the beginning, or a bear or a hummingbird”. … “ I will
teach you. I followed poetry” (Harjo 163-64).
Poetry seems to give Harjo’s life meaning, direction, and a sense of reawakening. In addition, poetry also
serves as a savior for Harjo, as Root corroborated when he wrote that “Harjo has consistently identified poetry as a
literal method of survival” (Root). In Root’s article, Harjo is quoted as saying, “I don’t believe I would be alive today, if
it hadn’t been for writing” (Root).
Through poetry, Harjo seemed to connect to her inner spirit, where her heart is opened to her innate wisdom
and healer within. These precious inner treasures were instrumental in transforming her creativity and spirituality into
poetry, painting, and music. From Harjo’s earliest childhood memories, she recognized that she had a special purpose
and her knowing helped guide Harjo on her life journey. With the help of Harjo’s knowing, the spirit of poetry seemed
to chase the darkness from her life and allowed the golden rays of the sun to harvest the beauty of her inner light. As a
result, as an artist, Harjo is free to spread her wings, soar like a hummingbird, and enjoy the sweetness and spirit of life.
~Works Cited~
Harjo, Joy. Crazy Brave, New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2012.
Root, William Pitt. “About Joy Harjo.” Ploughshares, Issue 95, Winter 2004-05.
www.pshares.org/issue/95/about-joy-harjo.
Scalici, Giorgio. “Music and the invisible world: Music as a bridge between different realms.” Approaches: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Music Therapy,
Special Issue 11 (1), November 2019, p. 150.
www.approaches.gr/issue/11/music-invisible-world.
Last semester, I wrote an essay about the unjust and oppressive history of the United States’ drug policy.
The essay touched on history from the very beginning of the war on drugs, with opium laws being used to target
Asian American immigrants during the early 20 th century, to more contemporary policies such as the crack versus
powder sentencing disparity which targeted black crack cocaine users. There is a fair amount of scholarly literature
surrounding these topics, so I felt confident that they supported my claim—that the United States has used their
drug policy not to protect people, but rather to oppress them—quite well. However, in the essay, I cited an obscure
piece of drug policy that doesn’t have as much scholarly literature and criticism surrounding it, the Marihuana Tax
Act of 1937. I cited this act as one which targeted Mexican American immigrants in the southwest who, like Asian
Americans with opium, brought over and spread the use of cannabis. Although this obscure piece of drug policy
history was only mentioned in passing in my essay, it still bothered me that it was not concrete or empirical evidence
that supported the main claim. Now, since the Intercultural Perspectives class has been studying Mexican American
history, it is a good time to answer a question I’ve had for a while: Was the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 meant to
oppress Mexican Americans in the Southwest? To answer this question, first the act itself must be defined, explored,
and laid out. Then, the factors that contributed to the passage of this act must be looked at. Finally, historical trends
in drug use should be examined and subsequently, how the drugs became available should be looked at as well.
Technically a revenue raising act, The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 did not make cannabis illegal. Instead,
it imposed taxes on growers, medical professionals, and importers. Importers had a particularly extreme tax (Padwa
and Cunningham 569). Additionally, by federal law, anyone who grew, transported, prescribed, or sold the drug
needed to register their product to pay the tax. But, since many state governments made cannabis illegal prior to
1937, doing so would be an act of self-incrimination. Overall, even though the act did not make cannabis illegal,
it did place regulations so tight that effectively nobody could use it legally. Oddly enough, the Federal Bureau of
Narcotics, or FBN for short (the predecessor agency of the Drug Enforcement Administration, or DEA), did not
seem to give much mind to cannabis use at first. In fact, according to the article “Marihuana Tax Act,” the FBN “at
first doubted the constitutionality of proposed federal laws for marijuana control, and feared that marijuana laws
would be difficult to enforce” due to how easily the plant could be grown on American soil in comparison to opium
and coca plants (Padwa and Cunningham 569). However, in the mid-1930s, pressure from local police forces in
the southwestern U.S. and pleas from state-level officials led to an all-out anti-marijuana campaign led by Henry J.
Anslinger, the head of the FBN at the time (Kinder, Douglas C. and Walker III, William O. 909). In October 1937,
the act passed despite resistance from medical professionals who believed the control of cannabis was unjust and
unnecessary.
During the 1910s and 1920s, there was a somewhat common association of cannabis with Mexicans in
the United States. During the 1930s, this trend became more popular (Griffin III, O.Hayde., et al 772). Mexican
immigrants were willing to work for extremely low wages compared to their Anglo counterparts, which led to a
dramatic increase in the competition for jobs. Cannabis use was not widely accepted, even by Mexican Americans,
but their association with the drug was already stereotypical—due in part to the all-out anti-marijuana campaign
waged by the FBN some years earlier. Cannabis use, whether real or imagined, was seen as a justification by
employers to favor white workers over Mexican laborers when it came to employment during the Great Depression.
It was used as a scapegoat—protection against employers so they wouldn’t come off as explicitly racist. Because
Mexican people themselves were stigmatized and “feared as a source of crime and deviant social behavior,” in turn
cannabis was viewed this way too (Campos 10). Also adding to the public fear of cannabis was the propaganda film
Reefer Madness, a public health and safety video alarming people of the dangers of “marihuana addiction.” Despite
its own admittedly fictional content, the film had a great impact on the public perception of cannabis nationwide.
It’s a matter of debate whether or not Mexicans immigrating to the United States popularized cannabis.
Mexico was regulating cannabis well over a decade before the United States passed The Marihuana Tax Act. In
1920, Mexico banned the sale, production, and recreational use of cannabis and in 1927 banned its export as well.
Perhaps this contributed to the migration of Mexicans northwards, where there weren’t any prohibitionist laws
surrounding the plant. However, a recent scholarly article analyzing Mexican immigrants’ role in the passage
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