The racialization of our country’s drug policies are a feature of the system, not a bug. From the very beginning, one of the explicit goals of American drug enforcement policy has been the demonization of what Harry Anslinger — the grandfather of modern-day drug enforcement — believed to be ”the degenerate races”. An often-overlooked part of this history is the way anti-Chinese sentiment fueled the enactment of America’s first drug control efforts.
The Angell Treaty of 1880, which was enacted in response to the rapid rise of anti-Chinese sentiment during the 1870s, banned Chinese nationals from importing smoking-opium into the United States. Pharmacologically identical, but less potent than other opium derivatives, smoking-opium was — at least at first — largely consumed by Chinese immigrants in California. ???