>...It "goes back" to Nixon needing a tool to criminalize the anti-war and racial justice movement.

The alleged Ehrlichman quote is brought up every single time drug prohibition is mentioned but it should be taken with at least some skepticism.

The surviving members of his family don't believe he made the quote:

>...Multiple family members of Ehrlichman (who died in 1999) challenge the veracity of the quote: The 1994 alleged 'quote' we saw repeated in social media for the first time today does not square with what we know of our father...We do not subscribe to the alleged racist point of view that this writer now implies 22 years following the so-called interview of John and 16 years following our father's death, when dad can no longer respond.[22]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ehrlichman

This is a very explosive quote - if Baum had included it in his book in 1996 I am sure it would have garnered a huge amount of attention for the book. Instead Baum did not include it in his book, but instead would wait for many years before making the claim when Ehrlichman was no longer around to dispute the quote.

If the quote was actually said by Ehrlichman, it isn't a very accurate description of the overall drug polices of the Nixon administration. While Nixon is remembered for "war on drugs" rhetoric, the actual substance of his policies is a bit different than what people think it was:

>...I have been fortunate over the years to discuss the distorted memory of Nixon's drug policies with almost all of his key advisors as well as with historians. Their consensus is that because he was dramatically expanding the U.S. treatment system (by 350% in just 18 months!) and cutting criminal penalties, he had to reassure his right wing that he hadn’t gone soft. So he laid on some of the toughest anti-drug rhetoric in history, including making a White House speech declaring a “war on drugs” and calling drugs “public enemy number one”. It worked so well as cover that many people remember that “tough” press event and forget that what Nixon did at it was introduce not a general or a cop or a preacher to be his drug policy chief but…a medical doctor (Jerry Jaffe, a sweet, bookish man who had longish hair and sideburns and often wore the Mickey Mouse tie his kids had given him).

https://www.samefacts.com/who-started-the-war-on-drugs/

>..."Enforcement must be coupled with a rational approach to the reclamation of the drug user himself," Nixon told Congress in 1971. "We must rehabilitate the drug user if we are to eliminate drug abuse and all the antisocial activities that flow from drug abuse."

>The numbers back this up. According to the federal government's budget numbers for anti-drug programs, the "demand" side of the war on drugs (treatment, education, and prevention) consistently got more funding during Nixon's time in office (1969 to 1974) than the "supply" side (law enforcement and interdiction).

https://www.vox.com/2016/3/29/11325750/nixon-war-on-drugs

>Reagan, however, was the one who really ratcheted up the criminalization aspect:

To say Reagan "ratcheted up the criminalization aspect" ignores the structure of the US federal government. The president does not make laws, the president can merely sign or veto laws made by the legislature. Unfortunately the drug policies of the 1980s were a bipartisan affair. The real bipartisan push for harsher penalties in the US came in the 1980s after basketball star Len Bias died of cocaine overdose.

>…Immediately after Bias's death, the speaker of the House of Representatives, Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill Jr., from the Boston area (where Bias had just signed with the Celtics), issued a demand to his fellow Democrats for anti-drug legislation. Senior congressional staffers began meeting regularly in the speaker's conference room as practically every committee in the House wrote Len Bias-inspired legislation attacking the drug problem. News conferences around the Capitol featured members of Congress extolling their efforts to clamp down on cocaine and crack.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2006/06/24/u...

>...It became the sole focus of legislative activity for the remainder of the session on both sides of the aisle. Literally every committee, from the Committee on Agriculture to the Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries were somehow getting involved. Suddenly, the Len Bias case was the driving force behind every piece of legislation. Members of Congress were setting up hearings about the drug problem and every subcommittee chairman was looking to get a piece of the action...

https://www.salon.com/2011/06/19/len_bias_cocaine_tragedy_st...

If you want to go back further, a good person to start with is Harry Anslinger who headed the Federal Bureau of Narcotics:

>...Prior to the end of alcohol prohibition, Anslinger had claimed that cannabis was not a problem, did not harm people, and "There is probably no more absurd fallacy"[15] than the idea it makes people violent. His critics argue he shifted not due to objective evidence but self-interest due to the obsolescence of the Department of Prohibition he headed when alcohol prohibition ceased - campaigning for a new Prohibition against its use.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_J._Anslinger

A difference with Nixon is that he was one of the first to try to greatly expand drug treatment and also reform sentencing in at least a small way:

>...the mandatory minimum sentence in a federal prison for marijuana possession was 2-10 years until Nixon slashed it to 1 year with a judicial option to waive even that sentence. No federal mandatory drug sentence would be rolled back again for 40 years (in the Obama Administration).

https://www.samefacts.com/who-started-the-war-on-drugs/