Drug Abuse, Crime

History of Drug Use as Crime

The criminalization of U.S. drug use parallels the sociopolitical events in the country's history. Drug use as a federal crime began with the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914 that taxed the manufacture, importation, and distribution of opiates and coca. Motivated by the government's desire to control opium users after seizing the Philippines at the end of the Spanish-American War, Congress expanded the act in 1924 to include the importation of heroin. At that time the United States was experiencing an influx of immigrants who brought their culture, including their patterns of drug use, with them. Asian immigrants introduced opium to the United States, and Mexican immigrants brought marijuana. With the societal belief that blacks favored cocaine, the false image of a crazed black man, high on cocaine and raping white women, helped fuel the public's moral panic.

The government's leading spokesperson for the criminalization of drug use was Harry J. Anslinger, who served as the first head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, later the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), from 1930 to 1962, and fervently promoted the criminal model of addiction. Through a series of improper research studies, false testimony given to Congress, and successful use as a legal defense, marijuana became known for inducing insanity and homicidal tendencies in users. The 1937 Marijuana Tax Act made it illegal to distribute marijuana without a stamp or license from the federal government. Because the government would not issue stamps, this essentially made marijuana illegal, punishable by a significant fine and prison term. The Boggs Act of 1951, passed during the cold war and while the country was fighting the Korean War and motivated by fear that the enemy was using drugs to sabotage the country's youth, increased penalties for drug crimes fourfold. The Daniel Act of 1956 followed the first televised Senate hearings on the topic of organized crime in the United States and increased penalties eightfold. In Virginia, for example, conviction of rape mandated a 10-year sentence, whereas drug possession mandated a 20-year sentence.

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