WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT # 4
TOPIC: "The Temperance Movement
(19th Century)"
Student: Dushkina Yuliya
On the demand of Professor
Marianne Lotfi
La Guardia Community College
2008
In the United States of America, like everywhere else, people always try to struggle
against bad habits, such as alcoholism and smoking. Let us look at the Temperance
movement (l9th century) and the anti-smoking campaign (20th century) and find some
differences and similarities. Both of them had analogous aims: to make people quit.
However, the objects of quitting were different. Thus, supporters of Temperance
movement wanted people (mostly the men) to stop drinking alcohol beverages and the
adherents of anti-smoking campaign want to prevent people (among whom there are
women as well as the men) from smoking tobacco products. Another similarity is that
both campaigns had significant results: from 1919 until 1933 alcohol was prohibited all
over the territory of the USA, and, nowadays, over 50% of Americans are covered by a
smoking ban of some degrees. However, we should notice that the alcohol prohibition of
1919 was absolute and had more powerful law base although it lasted only 14 years.
According to the information provided on the website "World Book Encyclopedia":
"Finally, the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States (passed in
1919) prohibited the manufacture, import, export, and sale of alcoholic beverages. This
amendment remained in force from 1920 until 1933, when the 21st Amendment
repealed it. "("The Rise of Women's Movements", par.5)
However, we cannot say the same about antismoking law because of some
constitutional nuances. Thus, there is Article One of the Constitution of the United
States, which does not grant the United State Congress the power to enact a smoking
ban under federal law, and the Tenth amendment says that it is one of the powers
"reserved to the states, respectively, or to the people". That means that only state and
local criminal and occupational safety and health laws can deal with smoking.
Unfortunately, some states do not have laws to regulate smoking not only in public
place such as restaurants and bars but also in non-hospitality workplaces.
Another difference is between reasons that motivated the activity of Temperance
movement in the past and motivations that had started the anti-smoking company
several decades ago. Temperance movement was activated mostly by social problems
caused by drinking alcohol, but in case with anti-smoking campaign the main issue was
about the health danger of tobacco smoking, and in first term for passive tobacco
smokers. According to the information provided on the one of educational websites of
Ohio state:
During this time (the end of the 19th century), the brewing industry was the
most prosperous of the beverage alcohol industries. Because of the
competitive nature of brewing, the brewers entered the retail business.
Americans called retail business selling beer and whiskey by the glass
saloons. To expend the sale of beer, brewers expended the numbers of
saloons. Saloons proliferated. It was not uncommon to find one saloon for
every 150-200 Americans, including those who did not drink. Hard-pressed to
earn profits, saloonkeepers sometimes introduced vices such as gambling
and prostitution into their establishments in an attempt to earn profits. Many
Americans considered saloons offensive, noxious institution.
("Why Prohibition?", par.3)
Anti-smoking campaign started when people began to realize that passive (second
hand) smoking could harm their health. Therefore, they started to be really concerned
about that fact as more scientific evidences were provided. According to the information,
provided by California Digital Library:
During the 1970s, as the scientific evidence of the dangers of environmental
tobacco smoke (ETS) was beginning to accumulate, a grassroots movement for
nonsmokers' rights emerged. When it became evident that tobacco smoke can
harm nonsmokers who inhale it passively, the public became less tolerant of
smoking in public places and the workplace, and restrictions on smoking began
to be implemented, by both government and private businesses.
Research conducted in the 1970s showed that children exposed to ETS have
higher rates of respiratory diseases. In 1981 several published studies showed
that nonsmoking women married to smokers have a higher risk of dying from
lung cancer than nonsmoking women married to nonsmokers. This work was
widely reported in the press, and provided the first strong evidence that passive
smoking causes fatal diseases such as lung cancer. Research on ETS rapidly
accumulated during the 1980s, and in 1986 major consensus reports by the
National Academy of Sciences' National Research Council and the Surgeon
General confirmed the evidence that ETS endangers children and causes lung
cancer in adults. In 1992 the Environmental Protection Agency listed
environmental tobacco smoke as a Class A (known human) carcinogen and a
major source of respiratory problems in children. Subsequent studies have
shown that exposure to ETS also increases the risk of heart disease.
("The Cigarette Papers", chapter 10, par.2-4)
We should also take into consideration that there are some differences between
methods used by participants of Temperance Movement and supporters of anti-smoking
campaign in their struggle against bad habits. According to the information provided on
the one of educational web sites of Ohio state:
The Woman's Crusade of 1873-74 was a culmination across the United States
of many years of women taking action against the saloon and the liquor traffic.
Women in the United States then enjoyed no direct political power, and direct
action - prayer vigils, petition campaigns, demonstrations, hymn-singing - were
among the few means at their disposal for seeking change. The crusade sought
to persuade saloon-keepers to destroy their beverages, close their doors, and
enter some other line of business. (“Woman’s Crusade of 1873-74”, par.1)
In conclusion, both Temperance Movement and anti-smoking campaign had a great
impact on American history, and the lives of thousand people had been changed. I
agree that anti-smoking campaign is very important, because the danger of tobacco
smoking was proven by scientific researches many times. However, we should
remember that a complete ban might have an unpredictable result like that happened in
1933 when the 21th Amendment repealed the ban for alcohol. Although smoking hadn’t
yet been completely prohibited, nobody knows what will happen in the future.
Work Cited Page
1. Glantz, Stanton A., John Slade, Lisa A. Bero, Peter Hanauer, and Deborah E.
Barnes, editors. The Cigarette Papers. 1996. 10 Feb. 2008
<http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft8489p25j/>
2. "The Rise of Women's Movement." World Book Encyclopedia. 2002.26 Aug. 2002.
<http://www2.worldbook.com/features/whm/html/whm008.html>
3. "Why Prohibition?" Prohibition History. 13 Nov. 1998. 14 Nov. 2002.
<prohibition.history.ohio-state.edu/whyprohibition.htm>
4. "Woman's Crusade of 1873-74" Prohibition History.14 Nov. 2002. <
http://prohibition.history.ohio-state.edu/ crusade.htm>