U.S. History and Government

Prohibition – ‘The Noble Experiment’ Name______

After WW1 there seemed to be just enough of the old crusading progressive spirit left to carry through the unfinished business of prohibition and suffrage reform. Prohibition was a movement of long standing (Lyman Beecher the preacher), and in its last stages it represented the final Populist-Progressive alliance. Rural support for prohibition (dry-states) stemmed from the protestant ethic and a rapidly growing anti-urban sentiment. Progressive support was grounded in the general reforming zeal associated with progressives and particularly in the drive for honest government and civic reform. Enforcement, the great problem of prohibition, was most effective in rural small town areas where the population supported it; in cities, far from rural, middle class values of populists, enforcement was at best sketchy. As the rural support of Prohibition became identified with the growing rural-nativist reaction, and even with the KKK, Prohibitionist sentiment fell off generally. Eventually, a vigorous anti-prohibition campaign was mounted.

Prohibition, as an extreme wing of the temperance movement, is one of the hallowed reforms from the 1840’s. As the wave of state prohibition laws passed in the 1850’s began to be repealed, prohibition agitators began to organize formally; the Prohibition Party founded in 1869 (founder John Russell), and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union of 1874 (leader Francis Willard) represented the two strategic approaches. When a second wave of state prohibition in the 1880’s receded, both were superseded by the Anti-Saloon League, founded in 1893. The League operated as a classic political pressure group, evaluating candidates for public office solely on their position on Prohibition. Carrie Nation took another route: spending a good deal of time in jail for trying to destroy ‘Demon Rum’ with direct tactics like taking an axe into a saloon destroying the keeper’s supply. In 1895 the Anti-Saloon League became a national organization and quickly rose to become the most powerful prohibition lobby in America, pushing aside its older competitors the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and the Prohibition Party. Its triumph was nationwide prohibition locked into the Constitution with passage of the 18th Amendment in 1919. It was decisively defeated when prohibition was repealed in 1933.

With the passage of the Webb-Kenyon Act of 1913, prohibiting the transportation of intoxicating liquors into “dry states”, a national prohibition began to seem possible. A temporary Prohibition Act was passed during the war to save grain for food, and state laws were being passed everywhere. By January 1920 when the 18th Amendment took effect, 33 states had prohibition laws. The central problem was the enforcement. The Volstead Act put 10,000 police on the streets of the “wet states” of the nation to enforce the amendment. This proved to be inadequate. Furthermore, police were often seen as part of the problem. The 18th Amendment proved a failure with its repeal in 1934, and the 21st amendment. The political lesson: it is very hard to legislate and enforce morality on others. The consequence: defiance, speakeasies, bootlegging, bathtub gin, guns, corruption, and Al Capone.

Statistics:

1) By 1810, there were at least 2,000 distillers producing more than two million gallons of whiskey. By the 1820s, whiskey sold for twenty- five cents a gallon, making it cheaper than beer, wine, coffee, tea, or milk. Annual consumption may have been as high as ten gallons per person.

2) By 1850 Annual consumption had fallen to 3 gallons per week.

3) The Anti-Saloon League was so powerful that even national politicians feared its strength. The Eighteenth Amendment might well not have passed if a secret ballot had made it impossible for the league to have punished the "disobedient" at the next election.

4) The WCTU's Department of Scientific Temperance Instruction promoted as scientifically proved fact that:

A. The majority of beer drinkers die from dropsy

B. When it (alcohol) passes down the throat it bums off the skin leaving it bare and burning.

C .It causes the heart to beat many unnecessary times and after the first dose the heart is in danger of giving out so that it needs something to keep it up and, therefore, the person to whom the heart belongs has to take drink after drink to keep his heart going.

D. It turns the blood to water.

E. [Referring to invalids], a man who never drinks liquor will get

well, where a drinking man would surely die.

QUESTIONS:

1) Name four Prohibitionists:

2) List three arguments for Prohibition.

3) List three arguments against prohibition.

4) What is a dry state versus a wet state?

5) Where was prohibition popular?

6) Where was Prohibition unpopular?

7) What factors contributed to the passage of the 18th Amendment?

8) What are some results of this 18th Amendment being ratified?

Although Prohibition decreased the amount of beer Americans drank, the amount of hard liquor grew. The beer decreased because it was harder to manufacture without getting caught so the price behind Prohibition