Cannabis Freedom Index

Changelog bd8960a

history: correct Fiji first ban to Ordinance No. 21 of 1905 with article; strengthen Vanuatu 1939 entry

The 1907 dating came from the review's publication/scan year; the Society of Comparative Legislation review covers laws passed in 1905 (N.S. vol. VII, p. 466), with a footnote attesting an untraced 1886 Gunjah Prohibition Ordinance. Vanuatu entry gains consolidation detail (ss 1, 4-5) while keeping the hedge that the 1939 wording was not read.

2 history entries edited1 article written1 file of code, design or docs +137 −8 lines

History changes.yaml

Edited 2

The New Hebrides' Dangerous Drugs regulation takes effect

description

Vanuatu's Dangerous Drugs Act began as Joint Regulation 12 of 1939 of the Anglo-French condominium and commenced on 1 December 1939. The consolidated Act prohibits listed substances and2006 consolidation prints it as amended through 2005, defining cannabis as the whole plant and cannabis resin separately, banning cultivation of the cannabisany Cannabis plant, and punishing occupiers who let premises be used for smoking cannabis or dealing in it; the 1939 wording itself was not read, so how it first treated cannabis is not confirmed.[@1]

Fiji bans bringing Indian hemp into the colony

date

19071905

title

Fiji bans the import ofbringing Indian hemp into the colony

description

Ordinance No. 21 of 1905 prohibited importing Indian hemp orand anything made from it: gunjah, bhang and chavas by name, plus anything the colony's chief medical officer judged capable of substitution for them. It was aimed at[@1] Cannabis had likely arrived with the Indian labourersindentured workers first brought to work the sugar plantationscolony in 1879.[@3] The colony had legislated once before, in an 1886 Gunjah Prohibition Ordinance whose text has not been traced.[@1] The year's survey of the empire's colonial laws summed the measure up as banning the import of substitutes for bhang.[@2]

sources

Review of Legislation, 1905: Introduction 1 unchanged

Articles and atlas entries 1

Code, design and documents 1 file

docs/research/history-fiji-1905-vanuatu-1939-2026-10-26.md +72 −0
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+# Research pass: Fiji 1905 import-ban article, Vanuatu 1939 entry strengthened
+
+Research checked on 26 October 2026. Fiji's first-ban entry is corrected from
+a Wikipedia-only 1907 dating to Ordinance No. 21 of 1905 on a contemporary
+legal review actually read, with a new properly sourced article; Vanuatu's
+1939 entry gains consolidation detail while keeping its honest hedge. No
+scores, profiles or timelines changed.
+
+## What was verified (all sources actually read)
+
+### Fiji Ordinance No. 21 of 1905 (entry corrected, article added)
+
+- Journal of the Society of Comparative Legislation, N.S. vol. VII (1906),
+  "Review of Legislation, 1905", Fiji section, p. 466 (read via archive.org
+  full text of
+  `journal-of-comparative-legislation-and-international-law_1906_5_part-2`):
+  "Indian Hemp. — Ordinance No. 21 prohibits the importation of Indian hemp
+  or any product or preparation therefrom, including gunjah, bhang, chavas,
+  or any article which in the opinion of the Chief Medical Officer of the
+  Colony is capable of substitution therefor." Contributed by W. F. Craies.
+  The section covers ordinances passed in 1905 ("Ordinances passed — 21"),
+  so No. 21 is the 1905 ordinance, not a 1907 one. Footnote on the passage:
+  "See the Gunjah Prohibition Ordinance, 1886 (No. 11)."
+- Same volume, Introduction, p. 401: the survey's Fiji line reads "Fiji
+  [prohibits] the importation of substitutes for bhang."
+- Wikipedia Cannabis in Fiji (read): cannabis likely introduced following
+  the 1879 introduction of Indian workers under the indenture system; the
+  same "Ordinance No. 21" quotation, misattributed there to "a 1907 legal
+  journal" (the journal volume is 1906; Google Books dates its scan 1907,
+  which is where the wrong year comes from).
+- UN E/NL.1948/45 (Fiji laws communicated; as cited on the existing 1938
+  entry): the Dangerous Drugs Ordinance took effect 1 January 1938.
+
+This resolves the open point in `history-fiji-gap-2026-10-22.md`: the 1907
+date was the review's publication/scan year, not the ordinance's. Entry
+`fiji-import-ban-1907` keeps its id (no inbound links to break, URL stable)
+with date corrected to 1905, retitled, and re-sourced; new
+`articles/fiji-import-ban-1907.md` (365 words, 3 sections, every source
+cited, links to the 1938 entry, the 2026 rewrite and /country/fj/).
+
+### Fiji 1886 Gunjah Prohibition Ordinance — dead end, not forced
+
+Attested only by the p. 466 footnote ("See the Gunjah Prohibition
+Ordinance, 1886 (No. 11)"). No text found: archive.org has no Fiji
+ordinance collection or 1886 gazette; Google Books API returns nothing for
+the title. Mentioned in entry and article as an untraced predecessor only —
+no 1886 entry created, no timeline change, since its scope is unknown.
+
+### Vanuatu JR 12 of 1939 (entry strengthened, no article)
+
+- Re-read the 2006 consolidation (`/tmp/vanuatu-dda.txt`, from the Trade
+  Portal PDF already cited): front matter lists JR 12 of 1939, JR 7 of 1952,
+  JR 3 of 1959, JR 34 of 1975, Acts 33 of 1984 and 29 of 1989, Instrument of
+  Variation Gaz. 25 of 2005; commencement 1 December 1939. Section 1 defines
+  cannabis (whole plant incl. seeds, minus mature stalk/fibre) and cannabis
+  resin separately; s. 4 bans cultivation of any Cannabis plant; s. 5 bars
+  occupiers/managers from letting premises be used for smoking cannabis or
+  dealing in it.
+- Because the print is a much-amended consolidation, ss 4–5 cannot be
+  attributed to the 1939 original. No article written; entry keeps the hedge
+  ("the 1939 wording itself was not read"), consistent with
+  `history-vanuatu-gap-2026-10-24.md`. The original JR 12 text (Western
+  Pacific High Commission gazette or UK/French colonial records) remains a
+  retrieval task.
+
+## Verification and files
+
+- `node -e` YAML load of changes.yaml clean (run before build).
+- `npm run build`, `npm run history:test`, `npm run answers:test` all green;
+  rendered `/history/fiji-import-ban-1907/` citation marks checked.
+- Commit limited to own work: changes.yaml Fiji + Vanuatu hunks, the new
+  article, this note. `source-archive.json` (concurrent writer) excluded.
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