1908 -- The Opium and Narcotic Act comes into effect, prohibiting the import, manufacture and sale of opiates for non-medicinal purposes. This act serves as the basis for subsequent Canadian laws dealing with the use of illicit drugs.

1923 -- Marijuana is made illegal under the Opium and Drug Narcotic Act.

1961 -- Canada becomes a party to the United Nations' Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. Canadian law is amended, increasing the minimum penalty for marijuana cultivation to seven years and that for importation and exportation to a minimum of 14 years.

1973 -- The federal government's Le Dain Commission of Inquiry into the non-medical use of drugs calls for an end to charges for marijuana possession and cultivation. Politicians of the day, including Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and Joe Clark, form a growing consensus in Parliament in support of decriminalization.

1992 -- Lobbyist Umberto Iorfida, president of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws Canada(NORML), is charged under section 462.2 of the Criminal Code with glamorizing and promoting the use of illicit drugs. The case is thrown out two years later by Ontario Court Madam Justice Ellen MacDonald, who ruled section 462.2 infringed on freedom speech, violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

1992 -- Brian Mulroney's Conservative government introduces a bill to double penalties for marijuana possession. It dies before becoming law when the Tories are defeated in the 1993 election.

June 1994 -- An Ontario farmer, Joe Strobel, is granted a federal licence to grow 10 acres of marijuana for research into the plant's industrial agricultural potential.

May 1997 -- The Controlled Drugs and Substances Act comes into force, consolidating marijuana laws previously found in the Narcotic Control Act and Parts III and IV of the Food and Drugs Act.

August 2000 -- Ontario's court of appeal ruled that banning marijuana for medicinal purposes violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Striking down a federal law prohibiting the possession of less than 30 grams, the court rules the law violates the rights of the sick to use the drug for medical purposes.

December 2000 -- Health Canada approves the Cannabis Medical Access Project, launching the country's first legal marijuana growing facility. A deep abandoned mine shaft beneath a northern Manitoba lake, larger than three football fields, is chosen as for the high-security operation.

July 2001 -- Canada becomes the first country in the world to legalize the use of marijuana by people suffering from terminal illnesses and chronic conditions

September 2002 -- The Special Senate Committee on Illegal Drugs releases its final report which concludes marijuana is less harmful than alcohol and should be governed by the same sort of regulations that control tobacco.

December 2002 -- The House of Commons Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs releases its final report, recommending decriminalization of possession of small amounts of marijuana.

December 2002 -- Charges against two volunteers at a medical marijuana club are thrown out of a Quebec Court. Judge Gilles Cadieux dismissed possession and trafficking charges, citing a contradiction between a law allowing the ill to use marijuana, and another prohibiting a legal source of the drug.

January 2003 -- Ontario Justice Douglas Phillips suggests marijuana possession laws are no longer valid, in his decision to dismiss two drug charges against a 16-year-old Windsor boy.