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Alfred Lindesmith

There was dissention against these polices. One dissenter was Prof Alfred Lindesmith. Lindesmith An Indiana University sociology professor who received his PhD University of Chicago in 1937 favored Treatment over incarceration(1 ).

From the 1930's to the early 1950s the FBN tried to intimidate Mr. Lindesmith. It started in 1939, Anslinger asked the FBN Chicago District Supervisor to inform Lindesmith employers the University of Indiana that a drug addict and a "collection of racketeers" were among the sponsors of a research organization Mr. Lindesmith publicly supported (the World Narcotics Research Foundation.), Thus began FBN guilt by association campaign against Lindesmith (2 ).

In 1940 Lindesmith wrote an article "the Dope Fiend Mythology" for The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, in it he was critical of the stereotyping and misinformation about drug addicts. Anslinger, was enraged he recruited San Francisco Circuit Judge Twain Michelson to write an essay. In the essay Michelson associated the spread of Japanese imperialism and the crimes of "burglary, robbery, forgery, rape and murder", and even nudism to drug addiction. Judge Michelson concluded his essay by calling Mr Lindesmith "pseudo-scientist" (3 ).

The choice of a judge ("debunking") was aided when Anslinger asked US Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, Herbert E. Gaston about Lindesmith's "Dope Fiend Mythology" Gaston responded "apology for addiction written from the standpoint of an addict. We might look for a college professor, a district attorney or other lawyer, or a law professor to answer him."(4 ).