If you would believe Wikipedia...

... and you may (with discretion), four of the first five presidents of the United States (all but Adams, the only to reach 90) made smoking use of hemp during their lifetime. So did Andrew Jackson and the great constitutor, Benjamin Franklin. Three of the six men reached age 84, only Washington fell short of 70, and all managed re-election. In fact, so far no president who is known to have smoked cannabis or its derivatives has been ousted by the electorate in a second-term bid, last reconfirmed a month ago. Taylor, however, died two years into his presidency at a mere 65 while Franklin's namesake Pierce was ousted from the Democratic ticket in 1856, much due to lifelong alcoholism (and a probable long-time depression from seeing his last surviving child's head tear off in a train accident at the onset of his one term).

Federal bans of narcotic substances sprung out from the 1950s, and was firmly established only through Ronald and Nancy Reagans re-escalation of the War on Drugs in the 1980s. If the Founding Fathers were condoning the use of drugs, however, their voices certainly called through the wall of prohibition to reach famous names such as Newt Gingrich, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Al Gore, Sarah Palin, John Edwards, Michael Bloomberg, Ed Koch, George Pataki, David Paterson and Barack Obama.

Just Say No to this man. But keep the Bill of Rights, please. What if, just what if Madison came up with any of the phrases for the first Ten Amendments while under consumption?

Benjamin, a smoker of hemp and alleged inventer of the phrase United States of America. How many shady deals has he overseen from the face on the 100-dollar bill?

Link here.

And yes, I'm aware that all the Presidents mentioned but Pierce also held slaves, and that it does not constitute an argument why they should not be prosecuted today for drug use as well. However, this is not a rant of how hemp and its consumption should be made legal, merely a Reaganesque reflection of how great men as Washington, Jefferson and Madison and their achievements may have become had they not indulged in the (apparently) recreational use of substances whose suppression is now considered paramount in almost all the free world. Pierce's failing struggle with alcohol is a good example of a soul whose achievements were hardly hampered by the fact it was "hempered".

End the War!