, until 1939. It has also been suggested that the extreme side effects, mentioned in Murphy's book, as well as many others, could have been attributed to indulging too heavily in the drug, thus qualifying as an overdose. Nonetheless, and most importantly, public opinion throughout the early part of the 20th century would have been in favour of Murphy's view, in other words, marijuana was regarded as dangerous.
             Murphy's book is somewhat skeptical to some of us today; however, it was taken to be very serious throughout the early part of the 20th century. What may have partially influenced her decision to write a chapter on the use of marijuana was, most likely, the problems involving the Chinese and opium in Vancouver. Opium was quite common from the mid to late 19th century throughout Canada. It was sold in the form of laudanum, and people used it for medical and non-medical purposes. Towards the end of the 19th century there were many Chinese people immigrating into British Columbia to work on the railroads, and had brought their opium "habits" along with them. Prior to the surfacing of Chinese immigrants, the use of laudanum was common, and up until then, acceptable in the non-medical sense as well. Unpredictably, opium users increasingly began to acquire a bad reputation and were seen as having a disease of the will, owing to the fact that the Chinese used it and were considered to be racially inferior. In 1907, racism eventually led to riots aiming to stop immigration into Vancouver, and causing millions of dollars in damages throughout Chinatown.
             Upon arrival, the government official hired to assess the damages done to Chinatown was presented with requests to compensate opium factories, in which authorities had no idea about. This ultimately led to the prohibition of opium and all of its derivatives in 1911, and a halt in Chinese immigration from 1923 to 1946. The racial a...