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Marijuana in Colorado Has a Long History 
Posted by CN Staff on January 01, 2014 at 05:50:41 PT
By John Ingold, The Denver Post
Source: Denver Post
Colorado -- Federal marijuana prohibition in the United States started with a knock on a Denver man's apartment door.Seventy-six years ago, a guy named Samuel Caldwell became the first person arrested and prosecuted under a federal charge of selling marijuana, after drug-enforcement agents busted him with 3 pounds of cannabis in his apartment at 17th and Lawrence streets. So historically significant was the moment that the nation's leading anti-marijuana crusader, Federal Bureau of Narcotics chief Harry Anslinger, came to Denver to watch the trial.
"These men," Anslinger said of Denver authorities afterward, "have shown the way to other district attorneys throughout the nation."Which makes it all the more startling that those men's successors will be standing aside Wednesday when Colorado puts the biggest ding in marijuana prohibition since its inception.Three-quarters of a century and an estimated 26 million marijuana arrests after Caldwell's, legal marijuana sales were set to start at 8 a.m. in Colorado, just blocks from where Caldwell was arrested. To Isaac Campos, a history professor at the University of Cincinnati who studies the drug war, the significance cannot be overstated."It's an enormous change," he said. "And what we could be witnessing is the first major, major crack in the whole drug war edifice."What has changed in the intervening years — what turned Colorado from the forefront of marijuana criminalization to leading the retreat from it — is simple enough to chart, Campos said. Activists buttoned down, donors put in big cash, voters approved medical marijuana laws, and a new industry created the first coherent marijuana constituency to push for change.What the change in marijuana laws has meant for Colorado — and what it will mean in the future — is far less certain.All marijuana use, possession and sales remain illegal under federal law, meaning Caldwell's crime is still just as illegal today as it was in 1937. But it has been legal for people 21 and older in Colorado to use and possess up to an ounce of marijuana for more than a year now, after voters approved a constitutional measure in November 2012.Reliable numbers for changes in marijuana usage, black-market activity, stoned driving, emergency room visits and youth access to marijuana in 2013 are still a year or two away from being available.SnippedComplete Article: http://drugsense.org/url/96ey4LELSource: Denver Post (CO)Author:  John Ingold, The Denver PostPublished: January 1, 2014Copyright: 2014 The Denver Post Website: http://www.denverpost.com/Contact: openforum denverpost.comCannabisNews  -- Cannabis Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/cannabis.shtml 
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Comment #2 posted by MikeEEEEE on January 01, 2014 at 07:01:27 PT
Statements
On this historic day, it's a sad statement that prohibitionist policy has caused so much suffering, on both sides of the fence. I believe I read something where Harry Anslinger, on his death bed, stated that he regretted the very policy he promoted. 
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Comment #1 posted by Sam Adams on January 01, 2014 at 06:39:00 PT
Post still fighting
>>>>Reliable numbers for changes in marijuana usage, black-market activity, stoned driving, emergency room visits and youth access to marijuana in 2013 are still a year or two away from being available.Translation: "we still don't like poor and/or dark-skinned people & we'll continue to harass you"Let's face it, the Post lost in a big way today. They fought this with lies & propaganda as hard as they possibly could for years. 
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