"Marajuana": How it Came to Be and Where It's Going

For thousands of years, the Cannabis plant was thought to possess powerful healing and regenerative properties. The people of India had long used Cannabis for pleasure, as well as a valued medicinal remedy for the relief of pain. As far back as 2800 BC, Cannabis was regularly used in regions of the Orient to treat illnesses such as rheumatism, gout, and malaria, as well as to expand the creative perception and expression among many of its people.

In 1546 AD, the Spanish brought "marajuana" (Castilian pronunciation) to the shores of America hoping to trade the plant for traditional agricultural products such as cotton and tobacco. Later in 1890, hemp became so popular as a raw textile, in the southern part of the United States hemp actually replaced cotton as the South's most dominant cash crop.

In the late 1800's, major American pharmaceutical companies began to include and promote "THC," the active ingredient in marajuana, in a variety of their drug products and actively merchandized it as a remedy for chronic pain.

In 1914, the United States Congress effectively criminalized the use of marajuana by enacting the Harrison Act, which, ironically, was expressly intended to prohibit the sale of opium and morphine and its derivatives such as cocaine. Nowhere in the Harrison Act did it ever mention marajuana, nor was marajuana ever considered a derivative of either morphine or opium. Notwithstanding, the umbrella of prohibition covered the use of marijuana, and it wasn't until 1937 that Congress passed the Marajuana Tax Act, which effectively prohibited the use or sale of marijuana for any purpose

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