Targeted Marijuana Law Enforcement in Los Angeles, 1914-1955

Abstract

Marijuana was illegal to possess or sell in California for 103 years. The state first banned it in 1913, grouping it with opiates and cocaine on a list of prohibited vice drugs adopted six years earlier, meaning that it was subject to the same penalties as these other, far more dangerous, drugs until 1961. In part this can be explained by the irrational and violent behavior reported to arise from marijuana use and employed by early drug warriors to justify the new prohibition. But these frightening effects that were commonly attributed to marijuana did not correspond to cannabis effects; and indeed, marijuana was not synonymous with cannabis until decades later. Initially framed as a “Mexican” drug, marijuana’s prohibition enforcement began on the periphery of Los Angeles in older Latino neighborhoods and agricultural outposts where immigrants lived, worked, and gardened. As the suburbs transformed into white residential neighborhoods, local police forces carried on the tradition of arresting and jailing Mexican and Mexican American citizens for marijuana crimes, primarily cannabis cultivation. Los Angeles police turned toward the city center, targeting Black residential neighborhoods around Central Avenue as well as the avenue itself, with its jazz musicians and multiracial nightlife. Cannabis smoking grew popular in hip Los Angeles circles in spite of the drug’s stubborn condemnation by the city’s deeply propagandized, white Christian hoi polloi. Actors and musicians in nearby Hollywood also drew the enforcers’ attention, and wealthy stars endured extraordinarily invasive policing and publicity related to cannabis use. By 1950, Los Angeles police were arresting more people for the possession or sale of marijuana than for heroin, other opiates, and cocaine combined. Mexican, Mexican American, and Black citizens were the targets of this enforcement in sharp disproportion to their presence there.

Keywords: marijuana, cannabis, history, indigenous peoples, drugs, Mexico, Los Angeles, narcotics, policing, Hollywood, dope, jazz