A Brief History of Hemp in America, Part I

Colonial and Post-Colonial Hemp 

Despite being banned for most of the 20th Century, industrial hemp enjoyed more than two centuries of legal production in Britain's American colonies and what would become the United States. Introduced to the colonies in1611, just two years after the first successful British colony at Jamestown was settled, hemp production boomed in the era before the American Revolution because of the durability and strength of hemp fiber.

 Colonists in Jamestown began cultivating hemp to make lamp fuel, paper, rope, sails, and clothing. The fiber was not only turned into thread, rope, and heavy canvas for household use, it also played a military role, being spun, woven, and fashioned into sails for both navies and commercial shipping. By the 1700s, various colonies even passed laws mandating that farmers grow hemp, and hemp was even used as legal currency in the Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia colonies.

 At the time of the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence was drafted on hemp paper (even though the official document itself was written on parchment from animal skin) and founding fathers such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson cultivated and advocated for the crop. The revolutionary Continental Army led by Washington wore uniforms made from hemp for its durability, while Jefferson not only grew hemp, he patented a hemp thrashing machine, and wrote a number of publications on best hemp-growing practices. 

While hemp's centrality to American agriculture declined over time, the 1850 census reported more than 8,000 hemp farms of greater than 2,000 acres. And President Abraham kept his household lamps burning with hemp seed oil.  

The 20th Century 

By the beginning of the 20th Century, hemp was being caught up in rising anti-marijuana sentiment, fueled by yellow journalism and racist attitudes toward the Mexican workers who popularized smoking marijuana in the US. Previously, cannabis had been consumed in liquid or tincture form or in the form of hashish, which was typically eaten, not smoked.

 While cannabis formulations were widely available from pharmacists and as patent medicines, the 1906 Pure Food & Drug Act marked the first federal effort to regulate—not prohibit—their uses. That act included cannabis among the various substances patent medicine makers had to list on their labels, so that concerned consumers could avoid it if they so desired.

 In 1911, Massachusetts became the first state to require a prescription for "Indian hemp." The first state-level criminalization of cannabis came two years later, in California, Indiana, Maine, and Wyoming. By 1933, marijuana was illegal in 29 states, including Texas, which defined it as a "narcotic" and mandated sentences of up to life in prison for simple possession. 

The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 and Beyond 

Following the lead of the states and upping the Reefer Madness-style propaganda, typically featuring a crazed, wild-eyed, ax-wielding pot smoker, Federal Bureau of Narcotics head Harry Anslinger led the push against the cannabis plant in Washington. The result was the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937, which effectively criminalized all cannabis sales, including hemp, by imposing a punitive tax on them.

 Shepherded by Anslinger, the bill passed the House after only a half-hour of debate before clueless congressmen, who had little idea of what cannabis was. Rep. John Dingle (D-MI) confused it with another plant, locoweed, while House Speaker Sam Rayburn (D-TX) explained to another House member that it was "a narcotic of some kind." The only witness to testify against the bill, a representative of the American Medical Association, was falsely accused of misrepresenting the group's position.

 Hemp production would be effectively banned until the end of the century, with the exception of a brief renaissance during World War II. With hemp imports from Asian countries such as Japan and the Philippines cut off by the war, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) created the Hemp for Victory program, which saw farmers cultivate more than 150,000 acres of hemp for the war effort.

 Although that brief respite largely ended with the war—the last legal commercial hemp grow was in Wisconsin in 1957—"feral  hemp" descended from those grows flourished across the Midwest and Plains States, leading countless naïve teens seeking a marijuana high to experiment with it, only to find out that even if you smoked a joint the size of fence post, all you'd get is a headache and a cough.

 Even more misguided than the reefer-seeking teens were the teams of DEA agents scouring rural fields and roadside ditches (thus the sobriquet "ditch weed") in an endless bid to eradicate the non-psychoactive remnants of the war-time program. The DEA's Domestic Cannabis Eradication/Suppression Program had eradicated more than 4.7 billion "feral hemp" plants by 2006. While the program was ostensibly aimed at domestic marijuana production, hemp accounted for 98 percent of all the plants eradicated.