Add to everything else the greed of rapacious big chemical companies. At a time when people were discovering that hemp (a very close relative) was in incredible source of many useful substances, Dupont was pushing for an oil-based economy. Many of the substances at the time that could be made by fractioning and recombining petrochemicals, could be replaced by less harmful substances from the renewable source of hemp. Americans in earlier centuries knew about it: many of the founding fathers grew it for ropes (hemp ropes stretch much better without fraying or tearing), paper (both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are written on hemp paper), medicinal (which we all know about), polymers (the first Model T Fords had their bodywork made from hemp-based "plastics"), and fuel. The problem with most if this is, people can make the things themselves; they don’t need big chemical companies to make it for them. Because they saw their potential profits going down the tubes, Dupont threw their weight behind the anti-hemp and anti-marijuana legislations.
Add to everything else the greed of rapacious big chemical companies. At a time when people were discovering that hemp (a very close relative) was in incredible source of many useful substances, Dupont was pushing for an oil-based economy. Many of the substances at the time that could be made by fractioning and recombining petrochemicals, could be replaced by less harmful substances from the renewable source of hemp. Americans in earlier centuries knew about it: many of the founding fathers grew it for ropes (hemp ropes stretch much better without fraying or tearing), paper (both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are written on hemp paper), medicinal (which we all know about), polymers (the first Model T Fords had their bodywork made from hemp-based "plastics"), and fuel. The problem with most if this is, people can make the things themselves; they don’t need big chemical companies to make it for them. Because they saw their potential profits going down the tubes, Dupont threw their weight behind the anti-hemp and anti-marijuana legislations.