On Feb. 14, 1924, the Harrison Narcotic Act required prescriptions for products exceeding the allowable limit of narcotics and mandates increased record-keeping for physicians and pharmacists who dispensed narcotics.

The U.S. has a long history of drug abuse. Legally, the United States imported opium for more than a hundred years. Morphine was in common use during the Civil War. Heroin was manufactured by the end of the nineteenth century. And cocaine, long a popular tonic, was marketed as a cure for narcotic addiction.