12 United States Presidents That Smoked Weed

5. Zachary Taylor

If you know the dark history of marijuana prohibition in the United States, you know that it began as a way to demonize immigrants.

The negative stereotypes that gave rise to paranoia about “reefer madness” first targeted the people displaced by the Mexican-American War from 1946-1848.

Zachary Taylor, the 12th POTUS, was a hero in that war.

In Taylor’s battle chronicles, he often describes smoking up with his troops (Taylor was a major general in the U.S. Army). Ironic, isn’t it?

6. Franklin Pierce

Franklin Pierce has a lot in common with the 12th President of the U.S., Zachary Taylor.

Pierce was also a commander in the Mexican-American War.

And in a letter to his family, he describes getting high as “about the only good thing” about the bloody conflict.

In the popular imagination, weed smoking soldiers is likely to conjure up images of the Vietnam War.

However, historians argue that cannabis was twice as popular among troops in the Mexican-American War than in Vietnam.