How Did The Civil War Decriminalize Drugs

The war on drugs and decriminalization of drugs

Drugs consumption has been a part of different cultures in all ages of past history. Drugs have been used for healthcare reasons, religious rituals by shaman and recreational use in past and present times. Drugs have been used in the United States as early as the civil war to help alleviate pain of wounded soldiers through the use of opium’s component morphine. Many of the soldiers that would return from the civil war would be dependent on morphine, and dependence on morphine amongst soldiers would be referred to as the soldier’s disease. In the early to mid 1800’s migrant Chinese workers that were brought to America in order to work on the railroads would smoke opium recreationally. Cocaine

“Patent medicines” were sold to people containing ingredients that included ingredients like alcohol, morphine, cocaine, and marijuana were sold in the US from the 1890 to 1906 (Levinthal 54). Drug use in various forms was somewhat common in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Concerns of drug dependence in the early 20th century began to increase and led to the creation of drug regulations for the first time in the US such as the Pure food and drug act of 1906 followed by the Harrison act of 1914. Those two acts of 1906 and 1914 were the first acts to begin the regulation of drugs. Through the years drug regulations have been modified to prohibit the use, distribution, and harsher penalties for those who engaged in drug defined and drug related crime. In 1968 drugs became a top political issue for President Richard Nixon. President Richard Nixon declared a total war on drugs, which led to new drug policies, high incarceration rates for drug related crime, high populations in prisons and large budgets to fund the war on drugs, and prisons. Although the war on drugs may have been seen as a good idea at the time, this approach does not look to have had the impact or outcome desired in the control of drugs, as 40 years later and billions spent on

The concern for drug use and abuse led President Nixon to promote a full-scale war on drugs. President Nixon and his staff made reduction of drug abuse one their main objectives. The Nixon administration worked hard on new policies to control drug use and distribution and came up with the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act. President Nixon and his administration were able to get enough votes and support from congress in order to pass the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and control act. The control of drugs was under the supervision and jurisdiction of federal law. State regulations and policies on drugs did not have any say on the issues and control of drugs. The controlled substance act amalgamated numerous diverse and overlapping drug laws that included the duplicate measures taken by other federal agencies. Creating this unification of double policies and installment of new policies against drug use and abuse, created a concrete federal regulation that was to be enforced nation wide. Under the controlled substance act five schedules of drug classification was created. These schedule classifications of drugs were based on the risk of dependence on the drug, potential for abuse of the drug, and the approved medical uses of the drug. Schedule 1 and 2 consists of the drugs with the most potential for abuse. Schedule 1 drugs includes; heroin, LSD, mescaline and marijuana.