Pharmacy and Medicine
Marijuana has been used as a medicine since it was first cultivated. Prior to the criminalization of cannabis in the United States, the medical value of cannabis was investigated by pharmaceutical professionals and companies.
Early records of medicinal cannabis in the United States, such as the two below, were unclear about what specific agent provided the medicial benefits of cannabis indica. Many early descriptions of cannabis focused on the traditional and medicinal uses of marijuana in India, trying to discover the “active principle” for its value.
The Pharmaceutical Era in 1898 (below), for example, reprinted an article from the British Chemist and Druggist saying that: "Of the pharmacy of Indian hemp there is little to be said until physiological standardization becomes a feature of our national pharmacopeia." Four years later, John Humphrey tried to identify active properties of "Cannabis Indica" for Merck's Report (below).
Debate about what specific cannabinoid caused the effect continued until the 1940s when Roger Adams extracted and identified d9THC from cannabis. Later, in 1964, Raphel Mecholum first drew the full chemical structure of d9THC. The identification of d9THC, alongside other cannabinoids, opened up further investigation into cannabis as a medicine. Early records related to cannabis medicine, however, tended to view the psychoactive effects of marijuana as “toxic” rather than medicinal.
As the debate continued about the active principle of cannabis indica, another question arose: whether or not cannabis sativa also produced the substance that causes an intoxicating effect.
For example, on the cover of a 1915 pamphlet published by Parke, Davis, & Co. (below), Herbert Hamilton directly asked the question in the title: “Cannabis Sativa: is the medicinal value found only in the Indian grown drug?” Hamilton's phrasing suggests a shift from a negative to a more positive connotation regarding the effects of cannabis—as evidenced by the changing language from “toxic” effects to the “medicinal value” of cannabis sativa.
Citing numerous studies, and his own self-experiments with cannabis tinctures, Hamilton concluded that “American hemp contains the active constituent.” Pharmacists and pharmaceutical companies began to take a new interest in cannabis and its extracts.
Eli Lilly and Company, for instance, explored the possibility of creating medicines from cannabis. On June 15, 1918, the Company wrote to Edward Kremers, Director of the Department of Pharmacy at the University of Wisconsin, to inquire into the possibility of obtaining “any quantity possible of American Cannabis, high test.”
Without any reply for almost three weeks, the company followed up on July 5, 1918, again requesting American cannabis. Kremers finally answered the next day to say that “we have but a few handfuls of American Cannabis,” which is not “sufficient for a good sample.” While Eli Lilly and Company did not receive their supply of American cannabis in 1918, it is clear that cannabis tinctures made from American cannabis were available at least a decade later.
The bottle of cannabis tincture to the left, dated November 7, 1928, is one example of such a cannabis tincture made by Parke, Davis & Company. The tincture was available at local pharmacies across the United States prior to criminalization. The label also clearly states that the tincture was derived specifically from American cannabis and that its “strength, physiological and therapeutic action [are] the same as that of Cannabis Indica.”
Despite its explicit description as a medicine, the bottle was also labeled as a "poison"—highlighting the contested nature of cannabis. It is clear, at this point, that the value of cannabis—whether labeled as “toxic” or “medicinal”—could be derived from American or Indian cannabis, even though the specific chemical structures of most cannabinoids remained a mystery.
Decades later, activists in the 1970s, led by Robert Randall and his band of medical marijuana patients, pushed anew for the medical use of cannabis. In 1976, Randall became the first acknowledged modern American medical marijuana patient (see below) by successfully suing the U.S. government for the right to use marijuana to treat his glaucoma. Randall’s doctor warned that his condition could cause him to go blind him by the age of 30.
Before turning to marijuana, Randall had unsuccessfully tried surgery and other medications, but a few federal studies conducted at UCLA by Robert Hepler in 1970 determined that marijuana helped reduce the eye pressure in glaucoma patients.
In 1973, Randall began to smoke marijuana regularly for his glaucoma, even growing a few plants at his house in Washington, D.C. Local police eventually confiscated them and told Randall to turn himself in. Randall instead decided to sue the government in lieu of pleading guilty. The case wound its way through the court system until the landmark 1976 United States v. Randall decision that made him the first medical marijuana patient and gave him access to 300 pre-rolled joints each month.
The case opened the door for other people to apply and become medical marijuana patients—most often for glaucoma or for nausea caused by cancer treatments. Wisconsin medical marijuana activist and historian, Gary Storck, for instance, shares a similar story. Storck tried marijuana at a young age and found that it helped with the pressure in his eyes caused by glaucoma.
Wisconsin, nevertheless, has not been quick to adopt medical marijuana legislation. Wisconsin continues to have no laws allowing access to marijuana for medicinal purposes. Despite multiple pushes since the 1970s and despite recent reports that the medical marijuana industry could bring $1.1 billion dollars to Wisconsin and also potentially reduce opioid deaths, Wisconsin continues to restrict access to medicinal marijuana.
Local opponents of medical marijuana cite "societal concerns" and conflicts with federal law to explain their resistance.
Further Reading
Booth, Martin. Cannabis: A History. MacMillan, 2005.
Dufton, Emily. Grass Roots: The Rise and Fall of Marijuana in America. Basic Books, 2017.
Storck, Gary. The Rise and Fall of Cannabis Prohibition in Wisconsin. CannaBadger Media, 2019.
See also: Robert C. Randall and Alice O'Leary-Randall Papers, 1965-2006, Wisconsin Historical Society.