The Protectors: The Heroic Story of the Narcotics Agents, Citizens and Officials in Their Unending, Unsung Battles Against Organized Crime in America and Abroad
New York: Farrar, Straus and Company, 1964.
First edition, first printing. Signed by Harry Anslinger on the front free endpaper and warmly inscribed to the recipient. xii, 244 pp. Bound in publisher's black paper-covered boards over oatmeal spine cloth stamped in black and red. Very Good with light rubbing and edge fading to covers, discoloration to rear joint, and bumping to rear board corners. Topstain a little scuffed and faded at gutter. In a Good+ unclipped dust jacket with sunned spine panel, light edgewear, moderate foxing and soiling, and two tape repairs to verso. Signed copies are rare.
Harry Anslinger is the man who invented the "War on Drugs," a core element of American domestic policy for almost a century. He ran the Federal Bureau of Narcotics from its inception in 1930 to his retirement in 1962, through five presidential administrations. Some have compared his influence to that of his rival FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, although Anslinger was much less well known. Anslinger actively pursued cases of mafia-related drug-trafficking, whereas Hoover was insistent that no such thing as the mafia existed.
Anslinger efforts against marijuana, which he at one point declared the most dangerous drug in the world, led to the drug's ban in 1937. He associated both marijuana and heroin with jazz music, which he despised, and relentlessly pursued the singer Billie Holiday. Throughout his career, he insisted that “strong laws, good enforcement, stiff sentences and a proper hospitalization program” were the solution to the problem of narcotics abuse. His legacy endures today.
Price: $1,250