The impetus for the prohibition of alcoholic beverages reached its peak during the so-called Progressive Era (loosely defined as the period between the 1890’s and 1920’s), a political, social and religious movement that sought to cure many perceived social ills, such as child labor, spousal and child abuse and neglect, poverty, crime, and inebriation, among others. It also sought to apply a “scientific” approach toward curing those ills, as well as applying scientific principles to industry, medicine, the social sciences and economics, among other fields of endeavor. Alcohol was seen by groups such as the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) and the Anti-Saloon League as a root cause of many of the above ills and as a threat to the family unit. Abstinence intertwined with the reformers’ goal of ending political and governmental corruption, since local political bosses were often headquartered at saloons (Mennell 159).
The prohibition of alcoholic beverages was not new. Laws against the sale of alcohol and other aspects of the alcohol industry had been in place for years at the county and state level. By 1917, three-quarters of local jurisdictions had enacted some restrictions on alcohol. Mounting pressures from reformers led to the introduction of legislation (the Volstead Act) to amend the United States Constitution in 1917 to prohibit and criminalize the manufacture, sale and transport of alcoholic (> 0.5 %) beverages. The amendment was ratified in 1919 and enacted in 1920 as the Eighteenth Amendment.
However, the Act did not ban consumption of alcohol and did nothing to dampen the public’s appetite for spirited drink. They would obtain it any way possible and organized crime, as well as “legitimate” businessmen, was happy to oblige. Bathtub gin and speakeasies abounded. Some have blamed Prohibition for the rise of organized crime in the United States, although it had flourished before Prohibition and did so afterwards (Timberlake).
The “Noble Experiment” had failed. The Twenty-First Amendment, repealing the Eighteenth Amendment and Prohibition, was enacted in 1933. It accomplished nothing but bloodshed, the tremendous expense of enforcing a law the public didn’t want and decreased respect for the law. The government could not or would not enforce the law. It did not decrease the drinking endemic and promoted rather than discouraged corruption among law enforcement and politicians. Morality could not be legislated.
In place of alcohol, another demon was raised that would destroy America’s youth: marijuana. As told by the much satirized 1936 movie, Reefer Madness, marijuana would lead to immorality, insanity, murder and death. “The War on Drugs” as the term was coined during the Nixon administration, enhanced the prohibitions that already existed against substances such as marijuana, cocaine and the opiates. Once confined to the Bohemian subculture and jazz musicians, the criminalization of drugs seemed to enhance their appeal to the general public. Even with the draconian Rockefeller drug laws in New York in the 1970’s (Kohler-Hausmann), the result has been that billions of dollars and countless lives have been spent enforcing the ban upon illegal substances that the public appears to want all the more because they are forbidden fruit. Not only has traditional organized crime profited, but the new wave of Eastern European and Latin American groups have flourished. These laws, like Prohibition, have failed to decrease crime and addiction.
In summary, rather than being progressive, Prohibition was actually self-defeating. The same can be said for today’s War on Drugs as well.
Works Cited
Kohler-Hausmann, Julilly. “Why It’s Time to Scrap the Rockefeller Drug Laws.” George
Mason University’s History News Network. 22 Jun. 2008. Web. 27 Feb. 2012.
Mennell, Stephen. “Prohibition: A Sociologic View.” Journal of American Studies 3.2
(1969): 159-175. Print.
Timberlake, Stephen. Prohibition and the Progressive Movement, 1900-1920.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966. Print.
