Americans convicted of “simple possession” of marijuana under federal law were pardoned on Thursday by President Joe Biden, who said “no one should be in jail for just using or possessing marijuana.”
No one is currently in federal prison solely for “simple possession” of the drug, the White House acknowledged, but the president said the pardons could help those with prior convictions who are seeking employment, housing or educational opportunities.
Biden also called on governors to issue similar pardons to those convicted of similar state possession offenses.
The action made us wonder how far back Tennessee’s marijuana law went, and newspaper archives allowed us to discover something surprising. The state’s initial ban on marijuana was passed after a series of articles in a forerunner of this newspaper alerted the public to the dangers of the substance.
Tennessee Gov. Gordon Browning signed the measure outlawing the sale, possession or production of what a newspaper account termed “loco weed” on Feb. 12, 1937. State Sen. Fletcher Morgan of Hamilton County sponsored the bill, and it had the support of the entire county delegation.