Most American states cut their marijuana possession penalties

In 1960 arrests and seizures for marijuana in the United States were at their lowest ever. Ten years later, in 1970, an estimated 200,000 people were arrested for possession. Within four years almost every state had cut the penalties it had raised in the 1950s.

Too harsh to enforce

By 1967 marijuana had become part of campus life, and the felony laws that sent users to prison began to look out of proportion. Police and prosecutors quietly diverted or dropped perhaps half of the cases against young users. By 1971 only 13 per cent of judges in one survey said they would jail an adult for possession, and 4 per cent a minor.

Virginia shows how change came. On 31 July 1969 Frank LaVarre, a twenty-year-old former student, was sentenced to twenty-five years, five suspended, for possessing marijuana. After Life magazine used his case to illustrate the nation’s drug laws, the governor pardoned him on 2 January 1970. In April Virginia made a first possession offence a misdemeanour, with up to a year in jail.

State by state

Period	States reducing possession penalties
By the start of 1970	21
During 1970	11 more
During 1971	15 more, and 14 cut again

Bonnie and Whitebread call much of this tokenism: many states simply gave back to judges the discretion over sentencing they had taken away in the 1950s. By the end of 1971 only Texas, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island still had mandatory felony penalties for possession. Bills to cut penalties failed in New York and California, and repeat offences stayed felonies in many states.

Congress moved too. The Controlled Substances Act of October 1970 dropped the federal mandatory minimums of the Boggs and Narcotic Control acts.

From smaller penalties to none

In March 1972 the national marijuana commission recommended decriminalising possession for personal use. In April the American Medical Association’s committees agreed that users should not be punished. In May the city council of Ann Arbor, Michigan, set a $5 fine for use, possession or sale.

The next year went further. In May 1973 Texas replaced what the authors call the country’s most severe marijuana law. In July Oregon became the first state to treat possession of up to an ounce as a violation with a civil fine. In August the uniform-law commissioners and the American Bar Association voted for decriminalisation.^[1]