SOCB50H3 Chapter 2: The-Social-Origins-of-Canadian-Narcotic-Drug-Prohibition
Document Summary
The social origins of canadian narcotic drug prohibition. Examines the processes that led up to the first canadian narcotic drug legislation, the. Opium act of 1908, and its much more ambitious successor, the opium and drug act of l911. The 1908 act was the result of the convergence of several social forces operating in. Canada at the turn of the century; among them were the general climate of moral reform, the international movement to stop the opium trade to china, and the hostility towards chinese immigrants in canada. Mackenzie king had been sent to vancouver in 1907 by the laurier government to assess claims for damages arising from the anti-asiatic riots which had taken place there. This historical accident enabled him to assume credit as the initiator of the an ti-opium statute. Once the first statute was passed, law enforcement agents and others interested in its extension entered into the definitional process.
