The two largest of these church movements -- Santo Daime and Uniao de Vegetal -- utilized yage in their religious services without interference by the Brazilian government until the mid-1980s, when U.S. officials pressured Brazil's Federal Council on Narcotics to put the banisteriopsis caapi vine on a list of controlled substances. The ayahuasca churches protested and a government committee was appointed to investigate the matter. After examining the churches' use of yage and testing it on themselves, the members of this committee recommended that the ban on ayahuasca be lifted. The Brazilian government acted upon this recommendation and legalized the sacramental use of yage in 1987, much to the dismay of the U.S. embassy.
