Law Making - Sociology of Criminal Law - Lecture Slides, Slides of Criminal Law

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Law Making

A Case Study of Drug Law in the

Twentieth Century

Nineteenth Century: A “Dope Fiends Paradise”

• The 19 th^ century had virtually no laws governing drug sales or possession - Because of this, the 19 th^ century has been called a “dope fiends paradise”

Drugs were widely available through concoctions such as “Mrs Winslow’s Soothing Syrup”, “Godfrey’s Cordial” and “McMunn’s Elixir of Opium” among others Typical users of narcotics drugs were white, middle class, middle aged women.

San Francisco: The Beginning of Drug Criminalization

• San Francisco is where drug criminalization began, in the form of a city ordinance banning opium
• This early ordinance was motivated largely by anger and hostility toward the Chinese
• Because the opium dens were now the only source of opium, many middle class women were forced to associate with the Chinese go get opium

The Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914

• After seizing control of the Philippines in 1898, federal gov’t recognized that narcotics distribution was international in scope
• U.S. sought international law that would limit distribution at the Hague Convention of 1912
• U.S. was instructed to develop comprehensive domestic legislation, which it did in the Harrison Act of 1914
• Act was, on the surface, a revenue measure; however, it was used as a means to criminalize narcotics

Controlled Substances Act of 1970

• Superceded prior drug control acts
• Established drug “schedules” which would

determine penalties based on abuse potential and risk associated with a drug

• Also established different punishments for dealers

versus users

• Dealers, typically lower class and minorities, were perceived as the primary menace

Summary of Drug Legislation

• Criminalization of Drugs is primarily a 20th^ century

phenomenon

• Drug laws are not the result of a preexisting

consensus of values or opinion; rather they are the result of careful political manipulation on the part of powerful stakeholders

• Drug laws are directed primarily (but not

exclusively) against the powerless, especially ethnic minorities and the lower class.