Race and the Drug War: History of ProhibitionA century ago opiates and cocaine were freely available and used both medicinally and recreationally by people throughout the U.S. Scores of patent medicines, elixirs and liquid concoctions contained substantial amounts of opium or cocaine. Studies published between 1871 and 1922 paint a striking portrait of the typical opiate or cocaine addict in the early 20th century: a middle aged, rural, middle- or upper-class White woman.(1) The peak of opiate dependence in the United States occurred near the turn of the century, when the number of addicts was estimated at close to 250,000 in a population of 76 million -- a rate never again equaled.(2) Yet despite the relative prevalence of addiction, the prevailing attitude at the time was that drug addiction was a health problem, best treated by physicians and pharmacists.
Public attitudes about drug use began to change as perceptions about drug users shifted. Opposition to opium smoking grew as it was increasingly linked to Chinese immigrants in the western United States. Strong anti-Chinese sentiment, exacerbated by a growing fear of competitive cheap Chinese labor, led to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which forbade further immigration. Reports that the upper classes were taking up opium smoking in New York and other cities led to heightened alarm. Fears that respectable white women were being seduced into a life of prostitution and debauchery in opium dens were inflamed by vivid reports. In 1902, the Committee on the Acquirement of the Drug Habit of the American Pharmaceutical Association declared: "If the 'Chinaman' cannot get along without his 'dope,' we can get along without him." In 1909 the United States' international war on drugs began when California prohibited the importation of smokeable opium.
In 1910 Dr. Hamilton Wright, considered by some the father of U.S. anti-narcotics laws, reported that U.S. contractors were giving cocaine to their Black employees to get more work out of them.(3) A few years later, stories began to proliferate about "cocaine-crazed Negroes" in the South who had run amuck. The New York Times published a story that alleged "most of the attacks upon white women of the South are the direct result of the 'cocaine-crazed' Negro brain." The story asserted that "Negro cocaine fiends are now a known Southern menace." Some southern police departments switched to .38 caliber revolvers, because they thought cocaine made Blacks impervious to .32 caliber bullets.(4) These stories were in part motivated by a desire to persuade Southern members of Congress to support the proposed Harrison Narcotics Act, which would greatly expand the federal government's power to control drugs.(5) This lie was also necessary since, even though drugs were widely used in America, very little crime was associated with the users.(6)
When marijuana was popularized in the 20s and 30s in the American jazz scene, Blacks and Whites sat down as equals and smoked together. The racist anti-marijuana propaganda of the time used this crumbling of racial barriers as an example of the degradation caused by marijuana. Harry Anslinger, head of the newly formed federal narcotics division, warned middle-class leaders about Blacks and Whites dancing together in "teahouses," using blatant prejudice to sell prohibition.(7) In 1931 New Orleans officials attributed many of the region's crimes to marijuana, which they believed was also a dangerous sexual stimulant. During the Great Depression, the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act came into law, again using racism as its chief selling point. The same Mexicans who were vying with out of work Americans for the few agricultural jobs available, it was said, engaged in marijuana induced violence against Americans.