NCJ Number
130504
Journal
Scientific American Volume: 265 Issue: 1 Dated: (July 1991) Pages: 40-47
Date Published
1991
Length
8 pages
Annotation
Americans have twice accepted and then vehemently rejected drugs over the past 200 years. These historical shifts are reviewed to provide perspective on current reaction to drug use.
Abstract
There is at least one major difference in the earlier and present waves of drug use. Anti-drug laws were not enacted until the public demanded them during the first wave of drug use. Today's most severe anti-drug laws were on the books from the start. The current frustration about the laws' ineffectiveness has been more intense because America has lived through many years in which anti-drug laws lacked substantial public support. Those laws seemed powerless to limit the increase in drug use during the 1960s and 1970s. Americans recurrently hoped that the technology of drugs would maximize their personal potential, but now, increasingly, drug consumption is viewed as reducing what individuals can achieve on their own with healthy food and exercise. The current era is similar to early in the 20th century when Americans directed their efforts toward self-improvement and against habit-forming drugs.