Timothy decided that the Ginsberg road was the way to go, that everyone should get their chance as long as they are reasonably prepared and are doing it in the right way, for the right reasons, with the right guidance. It's easy to play Monday morning quarterback and say that his decision didn't work out in that LSD got a lot of negative publicity, resulting in all research on it being banned for the last 30 years. It's easy to say that he decided with his heart rather than his head and that if it was all kept quieter, then research would have continued and that things would now be better. However, he made the right decision, at the time, because he did what he thought was right and best. The wrong decision would have been not to do what he thought was right and best, regardless of what the decision was. He just didn't realize how right Huxley was about the dimension and intensity of the mindless opposition they faced. Using a political analogy, Leary was like the candidate with vision who isn't interested in the political strategy games.

While at Harvard, Leary got involved with a prison program. Normally, neither psychologists, social workers nor anyone else wants anything to do with a prison because it's dreary, risky, and the prisoners are probably hopeless cases anyway. Leary, however, jumped at the opportunity. Nothing has ever succeeded in rehabilitating criminals. This would be a way of proving that psilocybin was not only as useful as he claimed, but could also succeed where everything else had failed. This would be a situation in which there would be verifiable statistics on whether giving psilocybin to prisoners is working. All one would have to do is check the percentage of released prisoners that wind up back in prison. If the prisoners that Leary was working with returned to prison at a much smaller rate, then that is the proof that is works.

The psychiatrist at the prison was very supportive but warned Leary that if he was successful, there would be trouble because those involved with prisons, law enforcement and fighting crime don't want to get rid of crime and criminals. They want more money to fight crime which really means that they want more money to stuff into their own pockets.

This was before Leary knew about LSD. So, he and others from Harvard were taking psilocybin with the prisoners at the prison with the support of the prison. Those running the prison were delighted that Harvard would want anything to do with their prison. The prisoners would learn how to run these sessions and in some cases would even be teaching the new Harvard graduate students how to do it. It was as if there was no difference between a Harvard person and a prisoner and it was all working. Hardened criminals were talking about peace, love and philosophy. Leary wanted to put this program into every prison, to no avail. The project ended once Leary left Harvard, but he proved that everyone was wrong to insist that it is impossible for hardened criminals to change for the better.

Here is a conversation that Leary had with the warden at the prison. It's a good example of the sick mentality of the society that he was up against and trying to make better. It's from page 89 of his autobiography, Flashbacks:

One morning in the second year of the project I came into Warden Grennan's office to report the most recent statistics. We had kept 90 percent of our convicts out of jail. He listened politely but kept glancing behind me. When I finished, he clapped me on the back and led me to the corner.