Talk-Polywell.org

...smuggling used to be an honorable American profession. In colonial times and into the early national period, the entrepreneurial smuggler who served consumers by defying the customs agents was celebrated.

http://reason.com/archives/2014/12/11/e ... ax-revenue

I did a blog post on that some time back

http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/200 ... dment.html

You might recall that John Hancock was a noted smuggler and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. And was the first and third Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hancock

America is in dire straights because it has forgotten its roots.

The was also Jean LaFitte, instrumental in winning the battle of New Orleans(in return for amnesty). Thought by many to have faked his death and lived on as a spy in contact with Abraham Lincoln and Karl Marx.

It's importyant to note neither John Hancock nor the LaFitte brothers were smugglers in the modern sense. They were not moving a specific item outlawed by a democratic society. They were breaking import/export laws and tax codes against governments they didn't respect. They were not moving drugs, and neither did Han Solo.

Han did smuggle drugs, remember him doing the "Kessel run?"
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Spice

We know Han was a smuggler but the subtext is obviously he is not rebelling against a lawful democratic government but rather an evil empire, and though people assume the Kessel run concerned rill or spice, I don't think there is any canon support for that view, and certainly I know of nothing Lucas has written to support it.

Sorry he was running a illegal spice into the system. George himself wanted solo to be a drug mule but the studio voted it down
Spice was more in the class of steroids or coke, more except able to the studio.
There are several different kinds of spice in the known galaxy; they are all grouped under the spice rubric not because of any chemical derivations, but rather because they "spice up" the user in some fashion, either temporarily boosting physical strength and stamina, making the user feel invincible, or heightening awareness or creating euphoria. These "spiced" up abilities do not last long and the user eventually needs another dose of the substance and quickly becomes addicted.
Remember he was "forced" into running spice to pay off some old gambling debts to Jabba the hut who held the title to his ship.
Han Solo and Greedo both work for Jabba the Hutt, a crime lord based on Tattooine. Before the events of the film, Jabba put a bounty on Han, who had been smuggling cargo for Jabba, but was forced to dump it to avoid capture by an Imperial search party. In the Mos Eisley cantina, Greedo corners Han, points his blaster at him, and forces him to sit down in a booth. Han tells Greedo that he has the money to pay Jabba back, but Greedo demands Han's money instead. Han says he doesn't have the money at the moment, quietly readying his own blaster under the table. Greedo tells him that Jabba has run out of patience with Han and that he, Greedo, has been waiting for a long time to take out Han. Han replies, "yes, I'll bet you have." Lucus swears Han did not shoot first
His only option was to side with the rebels because he had nowhere to go. Later taking up the rebel cause.

Yea I am a geek

Okay so you're confirming what I said--we don;t know Han was a drug smuggler, because the studio vetoed that part of the story (with good reason--you can't have your heros smuggling drugs in a PG film.)

Correct, and solo was smuggling a enhancement that was not legal in the system that he currently was in but legal elsewhere.

According to Lucas as well he did not shoot first when confronted in the Cantina.

In the original presentation of the story to the studio Solo was a bad guy, a drug runner, a gambler, drinker,womanizer, and a citizen of Mos Eisley where You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
But as we could not have bad guys win in a PG rated film they cleaned up his act.

I recall Lucas was surprised once about the popularity of another character, the bounty hunter that caught Han. His telling was that he was completely surprised at how enamored the audience was with Boba Fett and complained he was killed so easily in the conflict at the beginning of episode 6. People do love the bad guys, but note Jango and Boba were not really all that bad. Misguided perhaps, but not seriously evil.