O n 13 May 1966, a US Senate subcommittee questioned a former Harvard clinical psychologist, considered by many to be “ the most dangerous man in America ”, on the risks of psychedelics. Leading the inquisition of Dr Timothy Leary was Senator Ted Kennedy, of America’s unofficial first family. Amid a series of questions that reflected the moral panic about psychedelics then gripping the US establishment, Kennedy asked: “This is a dangerous drug – is that right?” To which Leary replied: “No, sir. LSD is not a dangerous drug.” Kennedy remained unconvinced. To the committee of politicians listening to Leary, psychedelics were behind the hippy movement, anti-war protests and the general breakdown of society. Earlier this month, almost exactly 60 years after this tense inquiry, Ted Kennedy’s nephew Robert F Kennedy Jr stood behind Donald Trump as he signed a new presidential executive order to accelerate mainstream access to medical treatment based on psychedelic drugs.…