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March 2001
The Hemp Scandal

By Angela Starks

 

What if there was a plant that could be used to make everything from durable clothes and paper to cars and the fuel that powers them? What if the mere act of growing that plant was good for the environment, and its seeds were one of the most nutritious foods known to humanity? It sounds like a miracle botanical that would take scientists years to genetically engineer, but actually it’s been used for centuries throughout the world. In fact, it was the planet’s largest agricultural crop from about 1000 BC until the late 1800s, producing the majority of the Earth’s fabric, lighting oil, paper and medicines as well as being an important food source for humans and animals. You’d think we’d be rushing to cultivate this wonder-plant in the U.S. but no; that would be illegal.

Hemp has been labeled an offender as part of the government’s fervor to rid the country of illegal drugs, their reason being that hemp gets you high (should we outlaw caffeine too?). But what the government seems to be ignoring is that even though hemp and marijuana come from the same plant (cannabis sativa), the psychoactive substance in marijuana is virtually non-existent in commercial hemp. If you tried to smoke the latter, all you’d get is a headache, and if you tried to smoke more of it, you’d just get an even bigger headache, a feeling not unlike that of trying to reason with politicians who have already set their agendas. Most hemp products currently for sale in this country have to be imported from the 32 countries that allow its cultivation, including England and Canada. The rest of the world doesn’t seem to have a problem distinguishing between hemp and marijuana.

In the U.S., hemp cultivation was actively encouraged until it was outlawed in the 1930s. It was permitted as legal tender throughout the Americas from 1631 until the early 1800s in order to ensure its cultivation, and you could even be jailed for not growing it during several periods of shortage. The U.S. Census of 1850 counted over 8,000 hemp farms, and that doesn’t include the thousands of small family hemp patches. The most commonly prescribed medicines in the U.S. during the 19th century were frequently cannabis extracts, and their use continued legally in both human and veterinary remedies until the 1930s.

Drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on hemp paper. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew it on their plantations. Henry Ford succeeded in using hemp and other plant materials to make his original prototype car that was also designed to run on hemp oil. But the powerful petro-chemical industries soon took over. Since petroleum is not only toxic but also non-renewable, hemp is now being reexamined as an ‘alternative’ fuel choice, but there’s still the hurdle of the politically influential oil lobbies.

Hemp’s environmental benefits alone should ensure that it is reinstated as a major crop. It is a member of the most advanced plant family on Earth and utilizes the sun more efficiently than most other plants. It can be grown organically with great success: it thrives in virtually any climate, resists most plant diseases, and it is naturally resistant to the usual pests. This is in contrast to cotton (again, a competitor against hemp) whose growers saturate the land with tons of toxic pesticides. Unlike most commercial crops that deplete the nutrients in the soil, hemp even enriches the very earth that it grows in. Also, the fact that hemp fiber is so strong means that its products last and last, thus conserving resources, which may not be very attractive to manufacturers who want you to buy new products over and over again. Manufacturers of synthetic materials such as nylon are thus another adversary of hemp. Incidentally, for nylon read petro-chemical; nylon is basically a plastic, and plastic is made from oil.

In 1999, legislation was passed in nine U.S. states to allow research (as if any was needed) and only limited production of hemp. Although mainstream acceptance and cultivation of hemp may seem a far-off dream, there are an increasing number of pressure groups and entrepreneurs who are calling for its reintroduction. As the public becomes aware of the truth about hemp, and with the combined efforts of pressure groups and hemp industries, experts predict that hemp could once again grace American soil within the next five years.

The Bush administration could ban any further progress—if we allow it. People’s ignorance of the true facts made it easy for competing industries, the corporate-sponsored media and a corrupt government to engineer its disappearance from farmlands (and even back yards) in the first place. We have every reason to get hot under the collar about what is, quite basically, a question of human rights. What right does a government have to ban a plant that humans have evolved alongside of and utilized since before the beginning of recorded history? It’s even more unsettling when we learn of the mass aerial spraying of toxic herbicides that places like Hawaii have been victim to, all in the name of wiping out this God-given resource. Should we sit back and allow the obliteration of hemp, whose extracts hold valuable medicinal properties and whose seeds can provide the essential amino acids and fatty acids required for health, just because a few powerful industries and politicians have deemed it to be a source of evil? If any of this sounds a little far-fetched, don’t take my word for it. Read the fascinating and thoroughly researched The Emperor Wears No Clothes: Hemp and the Marijuana Conspiracy by Jack Herer (Queen of Clubs, 1994).

For me, this is not a contentious issue, since the facts are clear. It has been conveniently molded into a contentious issue by means of misinformation and scare tactics, which have pitted citizen against citizen and resulted in parents worrying about their children getting ‘high’ if hemp becomes commonplace. Instead of being anxious about a marijuana culture, we should be angry that we have been misled and treated like fools for most of the past century in order to insulate the profits of a few large corporations. Even if you don’t care about hemp, please think about what this issue represents.

 


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