A former assistant commissioner of prohibition, Harry J. Anslinger, went on to serve 33 years as Commissioner of the Bureau of Narcotics in the Dept of Treasury and is widely viewed as responsible for the 1937 law banning marijuana.
Glorified and condemned by large segments of the society, drugs such as LSD and marijuana, rightly or wrongly, are in the forefront of the war against repression, youth and age, powerlessness and power.
At a critical juncture in a generational shift in February 1970, with enormous public interest focused on the subject of cannabis and drug culture, PLAYBOY magazine brought together a number of key figures to discuss and clarify the issues at stake. They included Baba Ram Dass, Leslie Fielder, James Coburn, Joseph S. Oteri, Alan Watts, John Finlator, Dr. Joel Fort, M.D. and Harry Anslinger (ghost author of cannabis prohibition) and writer William S. Burroughs, author of Junkie, Queer, Naked Lunch, Exterminator and other novels.
Harry Anslinger (77 years old) leads off the power room chat claiming:
“Cannabis stands just where it has for 1000 years. In the West it is used by psychologically and socially maladjusted persons who have difficult in conforming to societal norms.”
Dr. Joel Fort, who received his medical degree from Ohio State University, 40 years old, immediately corrects Anslinger:
“That is not quite true,” and lists the reasons.
The Playboy discussion follows the pattern where Anslinger “slings” drug war jingoism he invented, on the back of opium war tactics, to scare 1930s ladies groups and politicians into making cannabis culture and jazz culture illegal.
Allan Watts (55 years old) a former Episcopal minister known for his writing on Zen Buddhism, turns the direction of the conversation to the spiritual component of cannabis culture:
“It’s use as an aid to meditation and yoga has been dated to at least 700 A.D.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Anslinger responds.
“A person under the influence of marijuana can get so violent it takes about five policemen to hold him down.”
“Again, nonsense,” Dr. Fort responds.
“There isn’t a shred of evidence that mariijana itself provokes violence.”
“I would certainly agree with Dr. Fort,” William Burroughs (56 years old) interjects, one can only imagine the sound of his Harvard educated snear:
“After seeing people using all sorts of drugs, I have no no hesitation in saying that Cannabis is the least harmful of all the drugs in common use, with the exception of coffee and tea of course. I have never seen anyone become violent while using Cannabis.”
“I would like to point out,” Burroughs clarifies, “that the LaGuardia Commission Report of 1944 reached the conclusion that it did not provoke violence, and so has every other scientific study I’ve looked at.”
“The whole mythology of the pot-razed killer or rapist is just something dreamed up in the tabloids,” Burroughs continues.
View this article on our website.
