On Dec. 17, 1914. the Harrison Narcotic Act was passed by the U.S. Congress which mandated narcotic and prescription drug requirements. The act which regulated and taxed the production, importation, and distribution of opiates was proposed by Representative Francis Burton Harrison of New York City.

Harrison was lobbied by Dr. Hamilton Wright, a prohibition advocate, who claimed that cocaine gave Negroes superhuman strength, criminal drive, and hatred of white authority. Notably, the Act did not specifically prohibit drugs, but mandated that a physician, dentist, or veterinarian could only prescribe drugs “in the course of his professional practice”. Prosecutors interpreted that to mean that prescriptions for non-medicinal drug use were prohibited, and arrests of both addicts and doctors began almost immediately.

This Act is generally accepted as the beginning of American drug regulation. Over subsequent decades, the Harrison Act was revised to be more and more restrictive, and state laws were patterned after the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act.