Jen Hobbs - American Hemp: How Growing Our Newest Cash Crop Can Improve Our Health, Clean Our Environment, and Slow Climate Change

Hemp has an amazing and positive story. Throughout history it has been relied upon to clothe, feed, and shelter people all over the world, and recently it has also been used medically to reduce suffering from a wide variety of maladies. But beginning in 1937 with the passage of the Marijuana Tax Act, our own United States Government wrongly began the process of vilifying it by linking it to marijuana. Yes, the plants are similar, but hemp has never caused any harm whatsoever to anyone! But finally, hemp is now making a comeback. And one of the guiding lights who is showing the way is Jen Hobbs in her book American Hemp. The title says it all. A fascinating manifesto on the economic, environmental, and health benefits of the hemp industry. Read this book, and you will agree!

Judge James P. Gray, Superior Court of Orange County (Ret.)

This ancient plant may be a bright light leading the way to bring over 30,000 products to market and help farmers prosper well into the future. Jen Hobbss book is a must read for all true hemp believers!

Pam Ellison, founder of Minnesota Frozen Farm Forum

This book is a must-read for the licensed and non-licensed hemp cultivators and organic farmers looking for a crop with ultimate sustainability. The important history of hemp and the many uses of the sativa plant are examined. The research is already here, the facts are in.

Paul Frank, CEO of Hemp Solutions of Minnesota

Hemp has so much potential to help farmers, create jobs, spark innovation and new technologies, and make existing products better, stronger, and more sustainable. Thank you to Jen Hobbs for using her writing talent to educate and emphasize the importance of hemp for our countrys future.

Erica McBride Stark, executive director of the National Hemp Association

I ask questions for a living as a comedian and talk show host and have often wondered why hemp is illegal to grow. Why arent we growing this plant and using it for so many things? Why do we grow way too much of one crop and make another illegal? What can hemp do for you? Well, in this awesome book Jen Hobbs offers all the answers we need to make this happen.

Pete Dominick, comedian and Sirius/XM radio host

Copyright 2019 by Jen Hobbs

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Brian Peterson

Cover illustrations by gettyimages

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-4329-8

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-4330-4

Printed in the United States of America

For my daughter, whos too young to understand why the world is the way it is, but who isnt too young to deserve a better future (we all do).

I n 2016, I wrote Jesse Venturas Marijuana Manifesto with Jen Hobbs. The book outlined my philosophies on marijuana, detailed the impact of the war on drugs, and laid out the scientific benefits of cannabis. Although we focused on many of hemps beneficial properties and how it is different from marijuana, we didnt go into all of its aspects. Hemp needed its own manifesto, which is why Im pleased to write the foreword to Jens American Hemp.

After Jen and I published Jesse Venturas Marijuana Manifesto, more and more states have moved toward marijuana legalizationover half the US population now lives in a state that has legalized marijuana in some wayplus Congress finally legalized hemp in the 2018 Farm Bill by defining it as an agricultural crop, which we all know it has always been.

Colorado was the first state to legalize and grow hempthat was back in 2012. The fact that it took Congress six years to grow a pair and remove hemp from the Controlled Substances Act is unfortunately typical to say the least. But what really gets me is the contradictory attitude states have had when they chose to legalize marijuana, but not hemp.

Its common knowledge that you cant get high by smoking hemp. Smoke as much of it as you want. It doesnt have enough THC in it to affect you. Although this sets hemp apart from marijuana, it boggles my mind that states didnt pass ballot measures to legalize hemp and marijuana at the same time! Why did states go through all the trouble to legalize marijuana, but kept hemp illegal until years later?

Take Oregon for example. Oregon was the first state to decriminalize marijuana. In 1973 the penalty for up to one ounce of weed was reduced from a criminal charge (including jail time) to a $100 fine; it became fully legal in 2014. The state legalized hemp in 2009, but the Department of Agriculture didnt actually give out any licenses to grow it until 2015after the 2014 Farm Bill, the legislation that allowed states to start their own hemp research programs. Granted, many states were in legal battles with the DEA at this time because the agency was confiscating imported hempseed, but if a state has already allowed marijuana seeds to grow, why on earth is there an issue with allowing hemp seeds? Furthermore, as of January 1, 2018, I can legally buy marijuana, a recreational drug, in dispensaries throughout the state of Californiaand medical marijuana has been legal in California since 1996but as of December 2018, there werent any legal hemp farms operating in the state. Where does common sense come into this? And why did hemp lose the popularity contest? Is hemp not sexy enough? Do the thousands of known uses for hemp just bore America to tears?

Stranger still was always the federal governments classification of hemp and marijuana. Again, it doesnt take a scientist to tell us that hemp and marijuana are two plants that look similar but are not the same, yet the federal government classified them as if they were exactly the same. Until the 2018 Farm Bill, they were both classified as a Schedule I narcotic, the most dangerous drug classification (right up there with heroin) and getting caught with either plant by a federal agent could have come with the strictest legal consequences.

Even though I find it hard to believe anyone in the DEA could make these claims about hemp and marijuana with a straight face, the federal government did us a huge favor when it comes to this one-size-fits-all classification. Yes, we all know hemp and marijuana are not the same, but legally speaking they were being treated exactly the same under the Controlled Substances Act, so why not legalize both of them at the same time? Why did states put the marijuana issue ahead of the hemp issue if the federal government is treating them as the same substance? Congress made a huge error by not legalizing both in the 2018 Farm Bill, and now theyre turning the entire legalization process into a political issue.

When it comes to the 115th Congresss voting records, the GOPwhich held a majority in both houses until the 2018 midterm electionsblocked a number of commonsense, marijuana-friendly bills. Most Republicans voted no to increasing military veterans access to medical cannabis, no to ending the 280E tax code (the IRS doesnt allow marijuana companies to take any deductions or business expenses on their tax returns), and no to allowing marijuana business access to banking services. The only reason hemp was legalized in the 2018 Farm Bill was because Republican Senate House Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had been advocating for it for years.