Thinking Man’s Marijuana

In fall 2012, Bruce Barcott, a Seattle native who hadn’t touched a joint in decades, checked “yes” on the Washington ballot initiative to legalize marijuana. When it turned out that a majority had voted with him—not only in his state but also in Colorado—he began to wonder what they’d done. His attempts to answer that question grew into Weed the People, a chronicle of America’s ongoing experiment with legalization (and not, as the title might suggest, a eugenics manifesto). For a century, grass has been a political lightning rod and cultural badge. With legalization, it’s also a commercial enterprise, and not only for the Chapo Guzmans of the world. Weed the People is, in other words, a business book.

But marijuana isn’t just any business. The cast of characters in its story includes Pancho Villa and Fiorello La Guardia, Richard Nixon and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Millions of people are in prison today for selling or transporting or simply possessing it. Much of this has been covered before, but Barcott adds his own twists. He suggests it’s no coincidence that gay marriage and legal pot have gone mainstream at the same time. The two issues have been linked for decades: Gay-rights activists were early proponents of medicinal marijuana, fighting to give the drug to dying AIDS patients.