Deporting “Ah Sin” to Save the White Race: Moral Panic, Racialization, and the Extension of Canadian Drug Laws in the 1920s

This article argues that a Vancouver anti-drug campaign was critical to the extension of Canada’s drug laws in the early 1920s. The highly racialized drug panic resulted in extraordinarily severe drug legislation including six-month sentences for possession. This had particularly devastating effects on Chinese-Canadians who were targeted by enforcement officials and faced the possibility of deportation. However, the drug panic also affected drug users of all backgrounds who for long afterwards faced lengthy sentences for possession as well as civil liberties violations such as extraordinary search legislation and restrictions on the right to an appeal.