Tuesday was election day here in the United States (in case you missed that …) and here in California, Prop 19 and its effect on the state’s economy has grabbed lots of attention. California voters have already passed a law allowing the use of marijuana for medical purposes and Prop 19 was going a step further in legalizing marijuana for recreational use (only in California, right!).
Although it was not passed, it brought a lot of heated debate about the hemp industry. There is much confusion
So why was it illegal to grow hemp here in the United States? It was only in the 1930s when hemp (cannabis) became illegal. Before that it was widely used. In fact, the fourth U.S. president, Thomas Jefferson, was a hemp farmer. Did you also know that it was not just any string that connected Ben Franklin to the kite of his famous experiment? It was, in fact, a hemp string.
In 1937, William Randolph Hearst and the DuPont company were instrumental in passing the Marijuana Tax Act (making the possession or sale of cannabis illegal in the U.S.A.). Hearst wanted to see the hemp industry fail because he had a significant financial interest in the timber industry, which manufactured his newsprint and magazine empire, the Hearst Co. DuPont was in the textile industry, making synthetic material, such as nylon. DuPont knew that the prominent use of hemp would greatly impact the sales of their textiles. Greed was the main reason for the Marijuana Tax Act to be passed. That, and the confusion between hemp and the drug variety cannabis, marijuana. It was not until 1998 that the United States started to import hemp seed and oil.
