I was listening to Jello Biafra yesterday, and on his album I Blow Minds for a Living, he dictates the short history of pot and the legal system.
It's a well-known fact that hemp was a widely-used fabric, used in rope and clothing for centuries. Henry VIII of England made it obligatory for farmers to grow cannabis in order to make ropes and cords. The reason for this is that hemp is an exceptionally durable material, and is very hard to tear or rip. It's also exceptionally cost-effective, as large amounts can be grown in short time, especially today where we have UV lights, meaning we can grow it indoors.
Something I did not know until recently is that hemp was also widely used to make paper, and is a more natural way to make paper. To make paper with timber (I.E. wood) you need to use a lot of pulping chemicals in order to turn it into paper. But I'll get back to that later.
One thing you should know though, is that it was used to write the American constitution and declaration of independence. George Washington and Ben Franklin smoked it, too. Oh, and for all you christians out there? Up to the 19th Century, the King James bible was printed on... yeah, you guessed it... HEMP. Believe it or not, George Bush Sr. once ejected out of a fighter plane in WWII. His parachute was made out of hemp, as the US government had temporarily legalized cannabis in order to compensate for the cloth shortage. Neat, huh?
Among other uses of cannabis, here are a few important ones:
- It can be used to relieve pain, and medical marijuana is legal in some 38 states in the US
- Cannabis seeds can be used in cookery, and contain many beneficial proteins
- It can be used as biofuels, making it more efficient than using vegetable oil, as it can be grown quicker than crops.
Well, in America it was legal until the turn of the century. People used it for the above purposes, but they also openly smoked it and cultivated it. I mentioned earlier that it was considered far superior over timber as in order to create paper with timber, many chemicals needed to be used. Well, unfortunately the chemical barons got a little antsy about this, as they had just developed a new wood-pulping chemical and didn't want to see themselves go out of business. They pressured the government to make cannabis illegal, as did the tobacco companies.
In his book The Emperor Wears No Clothes, Jack Herer reveals that it was a company named DuPont who played a pivotal role in banning cannabis as they had just created several new chemicals that were challenged by hemp. In his book, Herer states that:
USDA Bulletin No. 404, reported that one acre of hemp, in annual rotation over a 20-year period, would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees being cut down over the same 20-year period. This process would use only 1/4 to 1/7 as much polluting sulfur-based acid chemicals to break down the glue-like lignin that binds the fibers of the pulp, or even none at all using soda ash. The problem of dioxin contamination of rivers is avoided in the hemp paper making process, which does not need to use chlorine bleach (as the wood pulp paper making process requires) but instead safely substitutes hydrogen peroxide in the bleaching process. ... If the new (1916) hemp pulp paper process were legal today, it would soon replace about 70% of all wood pulp paper, including computer printout paper, corrugated boxes and paper bags.
Hemp was therefore quite an easy target, as many companies were able to rally against it and call for it's legalization.
Anyway, I've had my say. I'd like to hear your views on the matter, and any research you may come up with!
Stay sane,
James
