Newsgroups: alt.drugs.culture,rec.drugs.cannabis,uk.politics.drugs
From: [an 169153] at [anon.penet.fi] (*Love*)
Date: Fri, 16 Aug 1996 11:17:38 UTC
Subject: Cannabis did not cause crime in India. 10/38    


   "... report of the Indian Hemp
Drugs Commission of 1893-94.  Despite its antiquity and
relative obscurity it remains in all probability the most complete
and well-balanced treatment of marijuana (and cannabis,
or hemp, drugs generally) in existence. ...
   In response to this mandate the Hemp Drugs Commission
worked essentially full time for over a year, made field trips
to thirty cities, and received evidence from 1,193 witnesses
(of whom 335 were medical practitioners) who were among
those in India most likely to be able to contribute information
on the issues.  The commission exhaustively analyzed not
only this information but also the records of many judicial
proceedings and the files of every mental hospital in British
India.  Throughout its work, the commission devoted careful
attention to the costs and the side effects of criminalizing
marijuana, as well as to the effect of the drug itself.  The
the commission published its report, together with six large
volumes of appendixes, which has, as recently as 1968, been
called "by far the most complete and systematic study of
marijuana undertaken to date."  ...
   The first of the commission's questions relevant to any connection
between marijuana and violence was "Are consumers
[of marijuana] offensive to their neighbors?"  ...
only about half of the total number of witnesses stated that
they knew anything about the issue, leaving the commission
to conclude that "it may be safely presumed that of these the
great majority have no experience of anything offensive in
consumers," a fact that spoke all the more decisively when
one considered the widespread and completely open use of
the drug in Indian society.  Moreover, of the seven hundred
witnesses who had opinions, six hundred stated that moderate
consumers are in no way offensive to their neighbors and
indeed in this respect "cannot be distinguished from the total
abstainers."  Of the one hundred who did find marijuana-users
offensive, most were referring only to excessive users, whom
they found offensive not because of the likelihood that they
would commit aggressive acts but because of "the smell of
the smoke," the "coughing and expectorating," or the "example
set to their [neighbors'] sons who are growing up."
   The commission next proceeded to consider another aspect
of the connection between marijuana and crime.  It began by
distinguishing between the long-run effects of the drug in
producing "bad characters" and its immediate effects in promoting
unpremeditated crimes of violence--what we would call
the "chronic" as opposed to the "acute" effects of the drug.
As to the first issue--the chronic effects--two-thirds of the
witnesses felt that no unduly large proportion of moderate
consumers were "bad characters," while a reduced number,
but still a majority, felt that even excessive consumption was
unrelated to "bad characters."  Moreover, where the issue
was more precisely phrased in terms of causation rather than
of simple association, a majority of eight to one "held that
moderate consumption of these drugs had no connection with
crime in general or with crimes of any particular character,"
while a majority of four to one felt that there was no causal
relation between excessive consumption of the drugs and
being a "bad character." ...
   One of the most important undertakings of the commission
was its careful examination of the statements made by
the minority of witnesses who did find a connection between
excessive marijuana use and unpremeditated crimes of violence. ...
And again and again it found that the connection with hemp
drugs had no greater foundation than in the Licata case.
   Indeed, after sifting the testimony of all of the witnesses
who alleged specific crimes attributable to marijuana, the
commission was able to find only eighty-one cases in all India
where the connection was even worth looking into.  Of these,
eleven were over twenty years old, and as a result, difficult
to check.  In twenty-three more cases whose records were
examined because they were easily procurable, it was clear
in eighteen that there was no connection at all between hemp
drugs and the crime. ...

In regard to the moral effects of the drugs, the Commission
are of opinion that their moderate use produces no moral
injury whatever. ... for all practical
purposes it may be laid down that there is little or no
connection between the use of help drugs and crime."
                         From "Marijuana The New Prohibition" 1970
                         by Professor John Kaplan
                         pp. 120 - 125  (pb.)


The use of cannabis in India, where it was legal and out
in the open, did not cause crime or moral injury.



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