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Dedicated to all the prisoners of conscience in this war against a plant, and to the enduring spirit of people everywhere who seek the truth so that we can continue to live on the surface of the Earth with all its myriad and abundant natural plants and substances.
The purpose of this book is to present an authoritative historical, social, and economic perspective needed to ensure comprehensive legal reforms, abolish cannabis hemp/marijuana prohibition laws, and save the Earth’s life systems.
I wrote my first book on marijuana, G.R.A.S.S., in early 1973. At that time I had no idea this plant could do anything, except maybe make rope, let alone that it was earth’s most important resource for paper, fiber, fuel, etc.
I completed the first Emperor in 1985, after 12 years of recording hemp information. It was meant to be the culmination of a highly focused personal crusade with my long-time friend and associate, Captain Ed Adair, to win the right to use marijuana and to educate people about hemp. It was Captain Ed who, since 1973, constantly encouraged me to record and compile the facts I obtained about marijuana and hemp.
As I gathered a fact here and a fact there, a bigger picture of cannabis hemp and its suppression came together—one that I had not originally expected.
What came together, fact after empirical fact, was a picture of a world being destroyed by a malicious conspiracy to suppress, not a “killer-weed” but the world’s premier renewable natural resource, for the benefit of a handful of wealthy and powerful individuals and corporations.
Over the years since the first publication of the Emperor, thousands more facts have surfaced, corroborating the information that was originally gathered, correcting some minor details, and adding substance and further insight to the hazier areas of my work. Esoteric details of a great conspiracy against humankind began to fall into place, like the filling in of a giant jig-saw puzzle. The entire text has been repeatedly revised. Whole new sections and sidebars have been added. Although this information has never been denied by the U.S. government, it has largely been ignored by the media.
I’ve seen more and more of my friends locked away in prison and/or had their homes, jobs, and businesses taken away from them as part of this escalating “War on Drugs” prohibition.
This has become a draconian nightmare for many of our best citizens who, having trusted their own intellects for their own health, have defied this bad public policy and have become not only prisoners of conscience, but actual prisoners of this war.
I hope that after reading this book you will stand up with me and recognize them—not as outlaws—but as the heroes who are attempting to save the seed that will save the planet.
New people have been drawn into this project, whose work has given it a scope and dimension I could only have hoped for at the beginning. They have brought with them skills and information that have been a major contribution to this effort. No egos surfaced as four or five of us stayed up night after night and only the best from each mind was brought forth.
When you write a book like the original Emperor, because the information which should be common knowledge is virtually unknown to our teachers and citizens, you always hope someone of great energy and intellect will read it, make it their own, and join in teaching others.
Over the years, hundreds, perhaps thousands of people who have read The Emperor Wears No Clothes have thanked me for writing one of their favorite books. At a “Grateful Dead” show, one Yale graduate even thanked and hugged me as his favorite author of all time and was thrilled that I was still alive! He had first heard his mother read him the Emperor when he was a small boy (obviously thinking of the 19th Century children’s classic, The Emperor’s New Clothes, by Hans Christian Anderson).
One day in late 1988, Chris Conrad, of Los Angeles, CA, read the Emperor. He became my ally. With his endless energy, prodigious editing and publishing talents and willingness to work 40 hours per week for almost five months, all the while holding down full-time responsibilities as production manager at a major weekly newspaper, as well as many other responsibilities for numerous organizations and causes. Chris did it all without any compensation, yet he worked like he was getting paid a million for it. Chris is one of the most powerful, energetic, skilled, and organized human beings I have ever known. He is a light bulb for all mankind. He designed every inch of that edition and was its main editor and enthusiast. During all this time Chris’ wife, Mikki Norris, lent her support in so many ways to this project.
Also, we want to extend endless thanks to the rest of our dedicated entourage.
Thanks to past associate editor and contributing writer, Lynn Osburn, who is both a great writer and marijuana/hemp energy scientist. Lynn set out to see and learn if, indeed, hemp was one of Earth’s primary renewable energy resources. He researched the technology needed to bring clean, renewable energy into use on the planet. The results of his brilliant endeavor can be found on almost every page of this work. And an excerpt from his paper, “Energy Farming in America,” is reprinted the appendix. Lynn’s work will teach people all over the world the beauty, necessity, and easiness of energy farming and conversion. While Lynn was researching this work he was arrested for a marijuana cultivation violation. He continued to work on this project day and night until January 2, 1990, when he was incarcerated in Ventura County, California, for a period of one year. He continued to actively edit this book from behind bars.
To another one of my great associate editors and contributing writers, Lynn’s wife, Judy Osburn. Judy has, out of necessity and outrage, become a noted authority and author on seizure and forfeiture law. The necessity arose from the government’s seizure of the Osburn family home in 1988. Since then they have worked out, with me, a plan to save the planet for our children. Judy’s excellent book, Spectre of Forfeiture, detailing her ordeal is now out of print but her other books are listed in the back of this edition of the Emperor.
To Shan Clark, for his active participation: editing, cataloguing, inputting, and for pushing this project and me forward when it or I might otherwise have stalled.
To my former assistant, Maria Farrow, who accompanied me from the Library of Congress to the Smithsonian and to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as we tracked down and interviewed dozens of government officials about hemp and hunted down hundreds of documents about the cannabis cover-up.
To Dana Beal, for all his work and research brilliance in connecting the DuPont Dynasties by Jerry Colby with the information on the outlawing of hemp.
To Jerry Colby, for his brave ingenious work, which awakened us to the megalomania of the DuPonts. To Ben Masel, for his hard critiques, great assistance, and research into the more esoteric abstracts on hemp cultivation world-wide and more.
To Julie Kershenbaum, for her excellent editorial assistance and proof-reading. To D.S.H., for his editorial assistance and meticulous concern for accuracy and readability. To Brenda Kershenbaum and Doug McVay, for proofreading and editorial comment for the 1990 edition. And again to Brenda, for the financial assistance to print the 1990 edition of Emperor.
To Steve Hager, John Holmstrom, and the High Times crew for their editorial assistance and total support, not only of this project but of their idea that the Earth could be saved and that each one of us can become a “Freedom Fighter” for this cause.
To the Wiz Kids from KnoWare, Ron Lawrance and Vicki Marshal, who of their own volition, scanned the old version of the Emperor into their Mac computers. When I returned from my fall, 1989 college hemp speaking tour, they handed me a surprise gift: the old book in word-processing form, which gave me the jump-start I needed for this huge undertaking.
To Timothy Leary, who encouraged Ron and Vicki and me to do this job. To George Clayton Johnson, who for four years constantly brought me fresh edits of the Emperor and loving encouragement to update and republish this book.
To my selfless landlords, Ed and Esther, who extended to me so much in deferred payments so that this project, which they believed in, would not cease or bog down because of my lack of funds.
To my friends, Doctors Tod Mikuriya and Fred Oerther, for their critique of the medical sections.
To Loey Glover, office manager at national NORML, for her constant support and warm encouragement.
To Gatewood Galbraith and Mark Brennamen, of Lexington, Kentucky, for all their remarkable research on behalf of cannabis and their fight for Kentucky citizen’s birthrights and potential.
To Barry for his extensive hemp archives which he made available to the hemp movement and ultimately to this project.
To my dear friends, Ron and Vicki Linker, of Starseed Collections of Athens, Ohio, who eloquently taught state senators and representatives and the people of Athens how ignorant (unlearned) they were about hemp and marijuana. Ron and Vicki are the truest of freedom fighters, who with Paul, Kevin, and Cliff and the Ohio University Ecology Club have educated the citizens of Athens, as no other city in America. On November 19, 1989, Ron began a two-year federal prison term for importing traditional Hindu smoking pipes (as he had for the past 15 years with the approval of Customs). At sentencing, the federal judge, having refused any hemp information to be admitted at trial, said “I only wish I could sentence you longer for all the lives you have destroyed with these [traditional Hindu] pipes.” Knowing the truth about hemp, Ron and Vicki feel deeply the injustice of his punishment.
To Ellen Komp, who tries to do everything for everybody at the same time, for all her contributions to, and editorial help on, the 1993 edition; to Ed Kunkel for helping us get over the finish line and to the printer; and to Chris Conrad for tossing us a lifeline once again at the last minute, and pulling us through. To Jeremy Stout, who patiently and encouragingly helped put together the 1995 edition. To Lynn and Judy Osburn, again, for editing the 1996 Emperor.
To all the others who believed in this work and extended encouragement, money, and credit even when it hurt. They are: David and Gloria Smith, Marco, Allan and Regina, Jon and Carol, David and Debbie, Steve and Chuquette, Roger, Gary H., Rooster, Dudley, Jim, Rose and Chris, Gail and Billy, the Friendly Stranger—Ed, Steve and Andrew DeAngelo, Rick Pfrommer, Peter A., Larry G., Floyd, Jean Michel Eribon, Ron Tisbert, Richard Marcella, T.C., Mitchel from New Jersey, Beau and Rachael, the late Jonathon Drewel (who brought us all his incredible energy from Southern Missouri University), Lynn “Thelma” Malone for keeping the homefires burning for the past five years, and to everyone who has read or contributed to this work that I may have left out.
To Michael Kleinman who had the foresight and the business acumen to help us make this edition of the Emperor the best one ever.
My hope is that this book helps everyone understand the true nature of cannabis hemp and that you, dear reader, decide to become active in the effort to end this crime against man and nature: marijuana prohibition. This book is meant to provide you with the tools, the incontrovertible facts, and the sense of outrage needed to overcome more than 60 years of continual governmental lies and suppression of the truth.
We have tried to be as factual and accurate as humanly possible, but there will always be revisions and corrections needed. Please send me copies of any documents and materials that will make the next edition of the Emperor even stronger.
We have already won the day; only no one knows it yet.
And once again to my 1998 readers and partners in discovery: thanks for all the documents, clippings, and tips you, all our cannabis fans, have sent to us over the past years. Keep sending us your new information that will help us put the pieces of this puzzle together for future editions.
To ReShard and friends in Treasure Valley, ID.
To my many editors, present and past: Leslie Cabarga, Jeff Meyers, Todd McCormick, Jeremy Stout, Lynn and Judy Osburn, Ellen Komp, Chris Conrad, Shan Clark, Bryce Garner, and Carolee Wilson. I want to thank you again for being the most outstanding collaborators, patriots, and hempsters I could ever wish to have worked with to illuminate the human race with knowledge, integrity, and perseverance. Thanks also to Stephen Saunders, Milo, Ivy, Michael M.: associate editors of The Electric Emperor CD-ROM edition.
And finally, to my girlfriend, Jeannie Hawkins, whose dedication to the hemp movement and hard work on this book have made me the happiest and luckiest hemp warrior of all.
Sincerely,
Director and Founder, HEMP (Help End Marijuana Prohibition)
the authorized on-line version of Jack Herer’s “The Emperor Wears No Clothes”
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| Introduction | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 |
| Overview of the History of Cannabis Hemp | Brief Summary of the Uses of Hemp | New Billion Dollar Crop | The Last Days of Legal Cannabis | Marijuana Prohibition | Medical Literature on Cannabis Medicine | |
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| Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 |
| Therapeutic Use of Cannabis | Hempseed as the Basic World Food | Economics: Energy, Environment, & Commerce | Myth, Magic, & Medicine | The (Hemp) War of 1812, Napoleon & Russia | Cannabis Drug Use in 19th Century America | Prejudice: Marijuana and Jim Crow Laws |
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| Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Appendix | Initiatives | Bibliography | Bonus Section |
| More than Sixty Years of Suppression | The Official Story: Debunking “Gutter Science” | The Emperor’s New Clothes | Original Sources | Recommended Reading |
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