Since making that recommendation, I transmitted to the Congress on
February 21, 1910, a report2 on
the International Opium Commission and on the opium problem as seen
within the United States and its possessions, prepared on behalf of the
American delegates to the commission, and I gave my approval to the
recommendations made in a covering letter from the Secretary of State
regarding an appropriation and the necessity for Federal legislation for
the control of foreign and interstate traffic in certain menacing drugs,
and requested that action should be taken accordingly.
The Congress has so far acted on the recommendations as to appropriate
$25,000 to enable the Government to continue its efforts to mitigate, if
not entirely stamp out, the opium evil through the proposed
international opium conference and otherwise to further investigation
and procedure.
I now transmit a further report from the Secretary of State giving cogent
reasons why the opium-exclusion act of February 9, 1909, should be made
more effective by amendments that will prohibit any vessel engaged in
trade from any foreign port or place to any place within the
jurisdiction of the United States, including the territorial waters
thereof, or between places within the jurisdiction of the United States,
from carrying opium prepared for smoking, and that would make it
unlawful to export, or cause to be exported from the United States and
from Territories under its control or jurisdiction or from countries in
which the United States exercise extraterritorial rights where such
exportation from such countries is made by persons owing permanent
allegiance to the United States, any opium or cocaine, or any
derivatives or preparations of opium or cocaine, to any country which
prohibits or regulates their entry, unless the exporter conforms to the
regulations of the regulating country.
The Secretary of State further points out a defect in the opium-exclusion
act of February 9, 1909, in that smoking opium may be [Page 183] manufactured in the United States from
domestically produced opium, and the pressing necessity for remedying
that defect by an amendment to the internal-revenue act of October 1,
1890, that would place a prohibitive revenue tax on all such opium
manufactured within the jurisdiction of the United States from the
domestically produced material; and he further urges the enactment of
legislation which will control the importation, manufacture, and
distribution in interstate commerce of opium, morphine, cocaine, and
other habit-forming drugs.
I concur in the recommendations made by the Secretary of State and
commend them to the favorable consideration of the Congress with a view
to early legislation on the subject.
The Secretary of State
to the President.
The President: On February 10, 1910, I had
the honor to lay before the President, with certain recommendations,
the report of the American delegates to the International Opium
Commission, held at Shanghai in February, 1909. These
recommendations were approved by the President and the report was
transmitted to the Congress on February 21, 1910, and is, with my
covering letter and the message of the President, contained in
Senate Document No. 377, Sixty-first Congress, second session,
The report contained a full and comprehensive review of the historic
attitude of the United States in regard to the opium evil as seen in
the Far East and a review of the recent international movement,
since its inception by the United States, to solve the problem.
Primarily, it seems clear that the United States was compelled by
its duty to the inhabitants of the Philippine Islands to secure
international cooperation for the control of the production and
illicit traffic in opium, which in the Orient had grown to enormous
proportions, threatening, during the first few years of the American
occupation of the islands, to debauch not only Chinese subjects
resident there but the natives themselves. Shortly after the
American occupation it was found that the vice of opium smoking was
rapidly spreading from the resident Chinese to the Filipinos, so
that whole communities of the latter were becoming impoverished and
rendered unfit for any economic or political life in the
islands.
To better this condition a committee was appointed by the Philippine
Government to make a comparative study of the opium problem as seen
in China, Japan, Burmah, the Straits Settlements, and Netherlands
Indies. This committee, after an exhaustive study, presented its
report in June, 1904, making therein certain recommendations which
were aimed gradually to reduce and finally prohibit the use of opium
in the Philippines except for medicinal purposes. The Congress,
however, took a more advanced step, and by the act approved March 3,
1905, provided inter alia for the prohibition of the importation of
opium in any form except for medical purposes on and after the 1st
of March, 1908. This act, with the supplementary legislation of the
Philippines Commission, and later of the Philippines Assembly, has
been at least 60 per cent effective in preventing the abuse of opium
in the islands, and it is hoped that if favorable action is taken in
the prospective international opium conference that the exclusion of
opium from the Philippine Islands except for medicinal purposes will
be accomplished.
The action of the United States and Philippine Government in regard
to the opium traffic in the islands appears to have had a profound
influence on those Chinese statesmen who felt that the Chinese
Government could and ought to destroy the vice of opium smoking in
China. It was regarded as a friendly act that a neighboring
Government in continuation of its historic attitude against the
opium traffic in the Far East should pronounce so firmly against the
misuse of opium in its Pacific possessions. At any rate, there was
shortly initiated [Page 184] a new
antiopium movement in China, out of which grew a direct appeal to
the President of the United States from representative missionary
societies and from commercial and reform institutions in the United
States to the effect that this Government, considering its previous
attitude in regard to the opium traffic in the Far East, should take
the initiative in assisting China to secure the gradual prohibition
of that traffic by the concurrent action of the powers concerned.
Thereupon, in the autumn of 1906, the Department of State addressed
a circular note to those powers having territorial possessions in
the Far East, the object being the investigation of the opium
problem by an international commission. The result was a happy one,
for 12 of the most interested powers joined with the United States
in an International Opium Commission, which met at Shanghai on the
1st of February, 1909. The commission made a thorough study of the
opium question, not only as seen in the Far East, but in the home
territories of the powers concerned. It developed that, in addition
to a serious opium problem in the Far East, the United States had
become contaminated by the vice, and that the habit of opium smoking
had spread from Chinese subjects resident therein to a large number
of Americans. Before adjourning on the 26th of February, 1909, the
International Opium Commission unanimously adopted nine fundamental
conclusions, which condemned the opium evil on both economic and
moral grounds, at the same time making certain recommendations to
the interested Governments for the control of the production and
traffic in opium, which it was hoped would sooner or later become a
part of international law. [For. Rel.
1909, p. 109.]
This community of opinion on the part of thirteen powers opened the
way for the United States to propose that an international
conference with full powers should meet to conventionalize the
declarations of the International Opium Commission and the essential
corollaries derived therefrom. Therefore, on September 1, 1909, the
United States in a circular letter to the interested Governments,
proposed that there should be such a conference, to assemble at The
Hague, to devise measures for mutual protection against the illegal
opium traffic. Since the United States proposed the conference the
scope of the latter has steadily broadened and, on the suggestion of
several of the cooperating Governments, it has been proposed that
the conference include in its discussions the manufacture and
traffic in other so-called habit-forming drugs, especially morphine
and cocaine, the illicit use of which is widespread in the United
States and is rapidly spreading throughout Indo-China and other
parts of the Far East, threatening to become more baneful than the
habit of opium smoking. [For. Rel.
1909, p. 107; 1910, pp.
298, 304, 325; 1911, p. 54.]
Thus, to the great credit of the several powers, a world-wide
movement is on foot to control the production and traffic in opium
and other habit-forming drugs, and the United States, with small
financial interests at stake, having invited the cooperation of the
several countries with great financial interests at hazard, has
resting upon it a heavy responsibility to see that its own house is
in order before the International Opium Conference meets at The
Hague in 1911.
Although it may be claimed that the position of the United States in
regard to the traffic in opium in far eastern countries and amongst
unprotected peoples in the Pacific Islands has from the first been
manifestly high; and that under international pacts and Federal
statutes citizens of the United States have been effectively
restricted from enforcing or encouraging the opium traffic in those
countries which desire to restrain it; it is clearly demonstrated
that the National Government has failed to realize to the full
extent the growth of a serious opium problem in the continental
United States. As stated in the report of the American Opium
Commission:
It seems that, as concerns the continental United States,
neither treaties, tariff, excise, nor other Federal laws
bore so heavily on the opium traffic or on those engaged in
it as to regulate the importation and confine the use of
crude or medicinal opium to legitimate medical channels. On
the contrary, vast amounts of this form of the drug have
poured in ever-increasing quantities into the United States,
while the opium-smoking habit, outlawed by nearly every
State and municipality in the Union, appears to have been
encouraged by the tariff and excise laws permitting its
importation and manufacture.
The enormous misuse of opium and other habit-forming drugs in the
United States may be attributed to several causes—carelessness or
ignorance on the part of the people; to ineffective State laws; as
well as to the inability of States with good laws to protect
themselves against the clandestine introduction of the drugs from
neighboring or distant States, and therefore in a larger sense to
the lack of control by the Federal Government of the importation,
[Page 185] manufacture, and
interstate traffic in them. And it is now certain that to these
several causes may be attributed the steady growth of another deadly
vice—that is, the cocaine vice—due to the unrestricted importation
of coco leaves and the unregulated manufacture and distribution of
its alkaloid, cocaine, a substance of no real use except in the
hands of the surgeon.
It is a startling fact that since 1860, when the various forms of
opium and its alkaloids were separately enumerated in the tariff
schedules, there has been a 351 per cent increase in the
importations and consumption of all forms of opium as against a 133
per cent increase in population. This immense importation and use of
opium in the United States is cause for serious thought and places
this country in an unenviable position compared with certain
European countries. For instance, it may be pointed out that in
Germany, with a population estimated at 60,000,000, there is an
annual consumption of about 17,000 pounds of opium; in Italy, with a
population of about 33,000,000, there is an annual consumption of
about six thousand-odd pounds of the drug; and in Austria-Hungary,
with a population of 46,000,000, there is a small annual consumption
of from 3,000 to 4,000 pounds. It has been estimated by the highest
medical authorities that 50,000 pounds of opium should suffice for
the medicinal needs of the American people; yet during the last 10
years there has been an annual importation and consumption in the
continental United States of over 400,000 pounds. Fully 75 per cent
of this opium is manufactured into morphine, and it is reliably
estimated that at least 80 per cent of such morphine is used by
victims of the habit, to their personal detriment, and with
appalling effects on general society.
Since the United States proposed the international movement for the
control of the production and manufacture of and traffic in
habit-forming drugs, every interested country has strengthened, or
has intimated its intention to strengthen, such national laws as are
aimed to restrict and ultimately confine to proper channels the use
of these drugs. While an important international agreement has been
made between the Governments of Great Britain and China which has
for its object the gradual abolition of the India-China opium trade,
the United States has taken but a single step forward, and that is
in the passage and approval of the opium-exclusion act of February
9, 1909, by which the importation of opium except for medicinal
purposes is prohibited. When this law was enacted, it was recognized
on all sides that it was but the first step necessary to be taken by
the Federal Government to regulate the introduction of opium into
the United States, and its particular aim and object was to exclude
from the United States opium that had been prepared for smoking
purposes, over 150,000 pounds of which were being annually imported,
with evil consequences not only to Chinese resident in the United
States but to vast numbers of Americans. But the opium-exclusion
act, so far as its prime object is concerned, has proved inadequate
in that it is still possible under the act to import for immediate
transshipment by sea opium prepared for smoking, with the result
that large quantities of this form of the drug reach Pacific ports,
are immediately transshipped to neighboring countries, and smuggled
into the United States. It would seem therefore necessary so to
amend the opium act as to prohibit any vessel engaged in trade from
any foreign port or place to any place within the jurisdiction of
the United States, including the territorial waters thereof, or
between places within the jurisdiction of the United States, from
carrying the substance or article known as opium prepared for
smoking. Such an amendment to the opium-exclusion act would strike
at the root of the matter by preventing ships in the Pacific trade
from transporting this form of opium to the United States. Such an
amendment would also be of great assistance to the Philippine
Government in that it would prevent all vessels trading between
Hongkong, Singapore, and Borneo from shipping opium at these ports
and bringing it to the islands.
The opium-exclusion act needs still further amendment. One of the
chief results attained in the International Opium Commission was a
declaration to the effect that it is the duty of opium-producing
countries to prevent at ports of departure the shipment of opium and
its preparations to countries that prohibit their entry. Not waiting
for the international opium conference to conventionalize this
declaration, several governments have already made it a part of
their law, and this Government has been requested by them to do
likewise. It would seem, then, to be necessary to amend further the
opium-exclusion act so as to make it unlawful to export or cause to
be exported from the United States and from Territories under its
control or jurisdiction or from countries in which the United States
exercises extraterritorial rights, where [Page 186] such exportation from such countries is made
by persons owing permanent allegiance to the United States, any
opium or cocaine, or any derivative or preparation of opium or
cocaine, to any country which prohibits or regulates their entry,
unless the exporter conforms to the regulations of the regulating
country.
There is still another defect in the opium exclusion act which should
be corrected. The act provides that opium shall not be imported into
the United States except for medicinal purposes, thereby preventing
the manufacture within the United States of the substance known as
smoking opium from opium that is imported, but it is still possible
under the act for persons so disposed to produce within the United
States domestic opium of a low grade and from it manufacture the
substance known as smoking opium. There is at present on the statute
books the internal revenue act of October 1, 1890, which regulates
the manufacture of smoking opium within the United States, and
imposes thereon an internal revenue tax of $10 per pound. This
statue was enacted at a time when there was levied on smoking opium
imported into the United States a tax of $10 per pound, and the
object of the October act seems to have been to impose a
countervailing tax of $10 per pound on all such opium manufactured
in the United States. It would seem that the just-mentioned defect
in the opium exclusion act, whereby smoking opium may be
manufactured in the United States from domestically produced opium,
could be met by so amending the internal-revenue act of October 1,
1890, as to place a prohibitive internal-revenue tax on all such
opium manufactured in the United States from domestically produced
opium, and that a bond might be required from an intending
manufacturer that would be prohibitory.
But even with the opium-exclusion act of February 9, 1909, and the
internal-revenue act of October 1, 1890, effectively amended, the
larger side of the opium problem as it confronts the Nation to-day
would remain unsolved. A wide inquiry has developed a consensus of
opinion that it is impossible for the States and the municipalities
thereof to effectively enforce their antidrug legislation and
ordinances until there is some Federal act which will strictly
control the importation, manufacture, and interstate traffic in the
more menacing drugs. Since the problem of the control of
habit-forming drugs first appeared in the United States, 45 States
have prohibited the sale of cocaine except on order from a
physician. Twenty-four States regulate the sale of opium and its
derivatives, and 13 restrict the sale of chloral. Several States
have recently enacted legislation making possession of these drugs
evidence for conviction, unless the person possessing them can prove
to the satisfaction of a jury that his possession is legal. But, in
spite of such State legislation, it has been found impossible for
the States themselves effectively to enforce their laws, because of
the ease with which these menacing drugs can be secretly introduced
from State to State.
After looking at the question broadly, the report of the American
delegates to the International Opium Commission states:
It may be said in regard to the traffic in habit-forming
drugs within the United States that each State of the Union
in its relation to other States is much in the position of
China in her relations with opium producing and trafficking
countries, for historically and otherwise, it has been
demonstrated that China could not control her internal
production and abuse of opium without a large measure of
interstate or international assistance. In three years more
has been accomplished in the suppression of the Chinese
intraprovincial opium traffic than was accomplished in the
preceding two centuries, this being entirely due to the
interstate or international effort now being made on her
behalf for the control of her opium traffic and her abuse of
the drug, in over-increasing proportion the States of the
Union have for 50 years from lack of interstate or Federal
aid, been reproducing within themselves the opium problem as
it appeared until quite recently in China. Studying by State
and municipal laws to control the traffic in opium,
morphine, and other habit-forming drugs, they have had to
face the fact that the Federal Government, by tariff law,
legalized the entry of a vicious form of opium, i. e.
smoking opium, as well as an abnormal amount of medicinal
opium for which a market was found by the importers and
manufacturers. It is now a developed opinion in all of the
States that no local law can control the abuse of opium and
other habit-forming drugs, and that there must sooner or
later be a superior Federal law to assist the States in
defending themselves from the menace of these drugs.
In view of the well-ascertained facts, and having in mind the
approaching international opium conference, it is a pressing
necessity that the Congress enact legislation which will control the
importation, manufacture, and distribution in interstate commerce of
opium, morphine, cocaine, and other habit forming drugs. After a
wide consultation with all the legitimate interests likely to be
affected by such legislation, there has been drafted a measure known
as the Cullom or Foster bill, which is now before the appropriate
committees of the Congress. The object of this measure is to place
as light a burden as possible on the legitimate importer,
manufacturer, and dealer in [Page 187] these drugs, and at the same time to bring the entire business
aboveboard and compel every transaction in the drugs from the moment
of importation or manufacture to be conducted in the light of day.
It is felt that if this object is achieved the good sense of the
American people will see to it that the illicit traffic, which is
now widespread, shall come to an end.
Shortly, this measure proposes that all importers, exporters,
producers or manufacturers of opium and other habit-forming drugs
shall be required to register with the collector of internal revenue
of his particular district his name, place of business, and place
where such business is carried on, and in the case of wholesalers
pay to the collector a special tax of $10 per annum, and in the case
of retailers $1 per annum. That there shall be levied and collected
upon all such drugs received, produced, or manufactured in the
United States a small internal-revenue tax which has been calculated
at a rate that will not deprive the American manufacturers of the
protection afforded them by the present tariff law. That all persons
importing, exporting, manufacturing, or engaged in the interstate
traffic in these drugs shall keep such books, render such returns
and give such bonds as the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, with
the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, may from time to time
prescribe, and that it shall be unlawful for any person to send or
transport or carry in interstate commerce any of the named drugs to
any person other than the person who has registered and paid a
special tax as required by the act; and further it is provided that
it shall be unlawful for any person to purchase, receive, sell,
transfer, or give away any of the named drugs on which the
internal-revenue tax has not been paid, or to which labels or marks
imposed by the act have not been affixed; and that, whenever on
trial for violation of the act the defendant is shown to have or to
have had possession of the mentioned drugs in violation of the act,
such possession shall be deemed sufficient evidence of such
violation, unless the defendant shall explain the possession to the
satisfaction of the jury.
Still further—and this is a most important provision—that all returns
required by the act shall be properly filed and recorded in the
office of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, and that, under such
regulations as the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, with the
approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, may make, these returns
are to be open to the inspection of and certified copies furnished
to the proper officials of any State or Territory, any or all of
whom may be charged with the enforcement of State, District,
municipal, or other laws or ordinances regulating, prescribing,
dispensing the sale or use of the drugs named in the act. It should
be stated that the revenue intended to be derived by the act has
been calculated at the lowest possible rate—at a rate that will
produce sufficient revenue to administer the act—for it would be a
most unwise procedure for the Government to attempt to raise a
revenue from the traffic in these drugs.
The amendments which I have suggested to the opium exclusion act of
February 9, 1909, and to the internal-revenue act of October 1,
1890, have been introduced into the Senate and House of
Representatives, and as in the case of the Cullom and Foster bill,
are before the appropriate committees of Congress. The attempt has
been made to treat the opium problem of the United States in a
comprehensive and effective manner. There are several other bills
before the Congress which attempt to deal with the problem; I do not
undertake to pass upon the constitutionality or the legal
advisability of any particular measure, but I respectfully submit
whether the attention of the Congress should not be called
especially to the subject, in order that appropriate measures may be
enacted for the suppression and control of the opium and allied
evils.
Finally, I recommend that the attention of the Congress be called to
the fact that the United States is bound by the action of the
International Opium Commission to apply an adequate pharmacy law to
American citizens resident in China, inasmuch as one of the great
evils growing out of the suppression of the opium evil in that
country has been the flooding of the country with anti-opium
nostrums or cures, the use of which threatens to become worse than
the disease. A bill having this end in view has been favorably
reported by the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate and is
now before the appropriate committee of the House of
Representatives.
Respectfully submitted,
P. C. Knox.
Department of State,
Washington
, January 7, 1911.
