Prohibition

Early Prohibition

The Prohibition Party was established in 1869 in an effort to enact national prohibition in the United States. The party philosophy was that the country would never achieve prohibition, and if they did, would not be able to maintain it under the current party system. The Prohibition Party gained some ground in 1894, but remained largely behind the scenes for most of the late 1800s.

It wasn't until the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union joined forces that the Prohibition movement really gained ground.

Prohibition and Social Issues

In the early days of the Prohibition Party, members focused solely on alcohol as its own issue separate from the other issues of the day. The Anti-Saloon League and Women's Christian Temperance Union took a different approach and linked alcohol with other social issues, such as domestic violence and labor, to gain the support of industrialists and women reformers. Linking alcohol with women's issues was an important strategy as women were actively working to gain the right to vote and by 1910, women had voting rights in some western states.

Some states had already joined the Prohibition bandwagon and by 1916, 19 states had prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcohol.

The Prohibition movement also appealed to people's sense of patriotism. The United States had just entered into World War I and Germany was one of its enemies. Many breweries in the United States were owned and operated by German-American families. At a time when cities with strong German roots, such as Cincinnati, were Anglicizing German street names and removing German wording from the fronts of buildings, closing down German-owned breweries was seen as a patriotic move.

President Woodrow Wilson also instituted a partial prohibition by conserving grain for the war effort, which limited alcohol production as well as potency—beer was limited to 2.75 percent alcohol by volume. By September 1918, there was a complete ban on the production of beer for the duration of the war.

Enforcing the Law

The 18th amendment ratified on January 19, 1920, banned the manufacture and sale of alcohol. Interestingly, the amendment did not ban possession, consumption or transportation, so it was not illegal to have or drink alcohol. It was only illegal to produce and sell it. This made Prohibition almost impossible to enforce.

First, the amendment drove the sale and production of alcohol underground. Large brewers relied on independent distillers in scattered locations and many people made their own alcohol at home. Second, although the sale of alcohol was illegal, individuals could still get prescriptions for medicinal alcohol, and prescription sales increased.

Additionally, the United States government didn't have the resources to enforce Prohibition laws properly. At the time, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was in charge of enforcing the laws, but they didn't have adequate support on the state level and in some cases, were met with corruption. When agents raided '21' Club in New York City, they encountered some of the city's leading citizens. Such raids rarely resulted in convictions.

By 1925, New York and five other states passed laws banning police from investigating Prohibition violations. Many cities in the Northeast and Midwest did not enforce the laws at all.

Results of Prohibition

Proponents of Prohibition have argued that despite its flaws, the law resulted in lower alcohol consumption and fewer deaths from alcohol-related diseases such as cirrhosis of the liver. The law also resulted in closing several breweries and saloons across the country and reducing alcohol-related crime, such as muggings, robberies and assaults.

Critics will argue that while disease-related deaths dropped, lack of regulation made alcohol more dangerous to consume. As a result, people died from consuming incorrectly-brewed and adulterated liquor and there were greater instances of blindness and paralysis.

Additionally, Illegal speakeasies replaced traditional saloons, and in 1927 the number of speakeasies rose to 30,000 — twice the number of saloons in existence pre-Prohibition. There was also an increase in solitary and hidden drinking and the law pushed beer drinkers to harder forms of alcohol.

While there was a reduction in alcohol-related street crimes, organized crime increased, as did corruption in government and law enforcement.

Prohibition also severely damaged the brewing industry. Some Breweries, such as Anheuser-Busch, shifted focus from brewing alcohol to making ginger ale, root beer, ice cream and even appliances such as refrigerated cabinets. Breweries that could not adjust, closed shop and did not reopen when Prohibition ended in 1933.

It was not only the unenforceable nature of the law or the rampant corruption that resulted in the repeal of Prohibition. The country was in the midst of the Great Depression and proponents of the repeal saw it as an opportunity to create jobs as well as much needed tax revenue from liquor sales. Franklin D. Roosevelt called for the repeal during his 1932 campaign for the presidency. The 20th Amendment, repealing Prohibition, was ratified on December 5, 1933.