The Criminalization of Marijuana in America Where did America go wrong with our policies regarding the use of marijuana? What driving forces are responsible for the stigmatization surrounding and policies forbidding the use of an herb that grows naturally from the earth's soil and can be utilized in so many ways that are beneficial to our health, our economy and, in turn, our society and the very world we reside in? The Bill that Banned Marijuana Surprisingly the origins are not as difficult as one might think to trace back. The first blow came with the 1937 Marijuana Act pushed forward by Harry J. Anslinger, the first ever to fill the position of Commissioner of the Treasury Department's Federal Bureau of Narcotics. At the time that he 1937 Marijuana Bill was passed, Anslinger was in office for seven years. However the exact details leading up to the bill that banned marijuana in 1937 become quite complex and, as many living today can testify, the conseq