On American Cannabis Policy

Along with the rise of social history research and the gradual severity of drug problem in our country, it is more and more important to study American drug problem and policy by comprehensive ways of history, politics, law, medicine, and sociology. My dissertation chooses American Cannabis Policy as a case; reviews the policy from many faces by placing it in country and society, Constitutional Mechanism, international views, and the whole changes of drug policy in USA; historically "thick describes" policy's origins, evolvement, and characteristics.Cannabis has been legal in USA for 3 and more centuries, this period is cannabis' legalization age. At the beginning of the 20th Century, Local governments take the lead in enacting law to control marihuana in southeast region of USA because of fear, and then urge Federal government take corresponding action. The vision of cannabis is gradually "demonized", and cannabis problem also ascends from regional problem to "national menace". Proceeding from response to crisis needs, Federal agencies whose chief is the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN) urge Congress to enact "The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937", which indicates the formation of marihuana control "Federalization". During the World War II, considering "Hemp for Victory", Federal government mobilizes citizens to grow cannabis and produce fiber, but the encouraging policy is combined with rigorous administration policy of FBN. Along with the end of war, FBN and its allies finally delegalize industrial hemp and medical marijuana. FBN's control scope farther extends, and cannabis control upgrades "absolute prohibition". In the early days after war, FBN and his allies change the methods, and combine drug control policy, the Cold War, with nativism, the policy more intensifies along with narcotics control aggrandizement, in final, cannabis policy grows "extremism".However, things will develop in the opposite direction when they become extreme. At the beginning of 1960s, the end of "Anslinger's Era" provides a chance for modulation of drug control policy, moreover, marihuana users' "embourgeoisement" more appends catalyzer for control weakening, and the reform of cannabis policy is...