Summary
- In Colonial and early America, alcohol was widely consumed and regulated at the community level.
- After the Revolution, the increased availability of hard liquor led to changes in drinking patterns and the rise of the temperance movement.
- The American Temperance Society was founded in 1826, and by the mid-1800s, several states had passed prohibition laws.
- The temperance movement revived after the Civil War, with the formation of the Prohibition Party and women-led anti-saloon activism.
- The 18th Amendment, prohibiting the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol, was ratified in 1919.
- During Prohibition, the Volstead Act defined the details of enforcement, but the law was widely flouted and led to the growth of a black market.
- The movement for repeal grew, and the 21st Amendment, ending Prohibition, was ratified in 1933 under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
American Drinking
Alcohol was the beverage of choice for the people of Colonial and early America. Not only was it safer than water, it was believed to improve both the physical health of the individual and the social health of a community. Problem drinking, when it occurred, was dealt with on a community level, through fines, public humiliation tools like the stocks, and in some cases, through banishment. Colonial legislatures regulated tavern licenses, hours, and prohibited activities like gambling and other licentious behavior.
This structure began to give way after the American Revolution as the pattern of consumption began to change. With cheap molasses flowing in from the West Indies and surplus grain coming from agricultural expansion, people turned increasingly to hard liquor like rum and whiskey. Distilling became seen as a somewhat seedy business, driven by the desire for high profits.
Temperance Movements
This change in the character of drinking, along with a series of religious revivals, led to the creation of a strong temperance movement in the early 1800s. The American Temperance Society was founded in 1826, and by 1831 had 100,000 members. Anti-drink crusaders spread the message all over the country, with a message about clean living that especially appealed to working-class men who were looking for new models of male behavior in the rapidly industrializing nation. By 1835, an estimated 1.5 million had pledged to abstain from alcohol and other vices.
The movement inevitably led to legislation, as new temperance converts petitioned their representatives to more control over spirituous liquors. Beginning in 1838, several states passed bills regulating the sale and consumption of alcohol; between 1851 and 1855, at least thirteen states passed prohibition laws. All were poorly enforced, and most were repealed by 1865.
Anti-Saloon Activism
The temperance movement revived after the American Civil War. In 1869, several state-level temperance groups joined to form the Prohibition Party. The first convention, held in Washington in September 1869, drew more than 500 activists — among them women, who were given full rights as delegates. Over the next few years, the Prohibition Party candidates for president and other offices, but never gained power as a third party. However, it did become an important player in the growing Progressive movement and was ahead of its time in the inclusion of women.
Women were among the most prominent players in the postwar movement. Activism focused on saloons and bars, which began in 1873, was almost entirely women-led, with groups staging demonstrations in front of drinking establishments, often for weeks at a time. This led to the creation of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WTCU) in 1874, which expanded into the World’s Women’s Christian Temperance Union in 1883. By 1892, they had over 150,000 dues-paying members.
Based in evangelical Christianity, the WTCU wanted to create a “sober and pure world” though the prohibition of all intoxicating liquors. But they also focused on other social issues of the era, including age-of-consent laws, the protection of women, and the “Americanization” of immigrants.
The Anti-Saloon League, founded in Ohio in 1893, was the first single-issue pressure group. Between 1895 and 1916, 23 of 48 states had passed anti-saloon or prohibition laws. Starting around 1913, the Anti-Saloon League and other groups began to press for national legislation, in the form of a Constitutional amendment to outlaw alcohol in every state in the Union.
The Volstead Act
Supporters of prohibition, known as “drys,” won a solid two-thirds majority of Congress in the 1916 elections and quickly put an amendment up for debate. It passed on December 17, 1917 by a vote of 282-128 in the House and 47-8 in the Senate. The 21st Amendment was ratified by the required three-fourths of the states on January 16, 1919 and went into effect exactly one year later.
The details of Prohibition were set by the Volstead Act, which was proposed by the Anti-Saloon League and championed by House Judiciary chairman Andrew Volstead of Minnesota. The act defined “liquor” as any beverage containing 0.5% or more of alcohol, which, to the surprise of many effectively, outlawed wine and beer along with hard spirits.
American Under Prohibition
The Volstead Act was full of loopholes and contradictions that it would have been hard to enforce, even if there was the manpower to do so. There was never enough funding to put enough inspectors in the field to stem the black market that sprang up to serve the thirsty nation.
People openly flouted the law, sometimes in private “speakeasies,” sometimes in public. For example, Congressman Fiorello La Guardia once called reporters into his office and poured grain alcohol into his non-alcoholic “near beer,” downing the glass right in front of them.
Supporters of Prohibition later pointed to statistics that showed that the death rate among men from cirrhosis of the liver — a condition caused by long-term alcohol abuse — dropped from 29.5 per 100,000 in 1911 to 10.7 per 100,000 in 1929. Arrests for public drunkenness dropped 50% during the same period. Critics countered that at least 10,000 people were killed, and many more blinded or injured, from alcohol poisoning caused by unregulated production and homebrewing of “rot-gut” liquor, and there was 24% rise in violent crime caused by warring black-market producers. Ultimately, there was an overall increase in alcohol consumption during the 14 years the amendment was in force.
The End of the Prohibition Era
The movement for repeal grew to the point where Franklin D. Roosevelt included it as a campaign plank in 1932. Just eight days into his first term, Roosevelt told his advisor “it’s time the country did something about beer.” He sent a short statement to Congress asking for a modification of the Volstead Act to re-legalize the manufacture of beer. “I deem the action at this time to be of the highest importance.” The statement was met by applause on the floor of the House and passed by both chambers in just 30 hours.
With a proposed repeal amendment already under debate in Congress, things proceed rapidly. The 21st Amendment was sent to the states in April 1933 and was certified on December 5, 1933 after being passed by three-fourths of the states. In a statement after the certification, Roosevelt said:
“I trust in the good sense of the American people that they will not bring upon themselves the curse of excessive use of intoxicating liquors to the detriment of health, morals and social integrity. The objective we seek through a national policy is the education of every citizen towards a greater temperance throughout the nation.”
Further Reading:
Behr, Edward. Prohibition: Thirteen Years That Changed America. United States, Arcade, 2011.
McGirr, Lisa. The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State. United Kingdom, W. W. Norton, 2015.
Okrent, Daniel. Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition. United Kingdom, Scribner, 2010.
Rose, Kenneth D.. American Women and the Repeal of Prohibition. United States, NYU Press, 1997.