Name __________________________
Date: ________________
Section: 11.1
11.2
(circle one)
U. S. History II
HW 5.2: Prohibition
Instructions
1. Carefully read and annotate this article for MAIN IDEAS
2. Identify the following key terms (including date, definition, and significance):
a. Consumer culture (use your lecture notes)
b. Prohibition
c. 18th Amendment
d. Bootlegger
e. Speakeasy
f. Al Capone
g. 21st Amendment
3. Complete the chart below. Use the reading to summarize, in your own words, the
causes (why did Prohibition happen?) and effects (what effect did Prohibition have
of American society?) of Prohibition. You should have at least 4 separate points on
each side:
Causes of Prohibition
Effects of Prohibition
The Prohibition Experiment
Source: Gerald A. Danzer et al., The Americans: Reconstruction through the 20th Century (Boston:
McDougal Littell).
One vigorous clash between small town and big-city Americans began in earnest in January
1920, when the Eighteenth Amendment went into effect. This amendment, which prohibited
the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages, launched the era known as
Prohibition.
Reformers had long considered liquor a
prime cause of corruption. They thought
that too much drinking led to crime, wife
and child abuse, accidents on the job, and
other serious social problems.
Industrialists, such as Henry Ford, were
also concerned about the impact of
drinking on labor productivity. The churchaffiliated Anti-Saloon League had led the
drive to pass the prohibition amendment.
The Women's Christian Temperance Union,
which considered drinking a sin, had
helped push the measure through.
Advocates of Prohibition argued that
outlawing drinking would eliminate
corruption and help Americanize
immigrants.
Even before the 18th Amendment was ratified, about 65% of the country had already banned
alcohol. In 1916, seven states adopted anti-liquor laws, bringing the number of states to 19 that
prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages. America's entry into World War I
allowed many to defend national Prohibition as a war measure. Prohibition seemed patriotic
since many breweries were owned by German Americans. In December 1917, Congress passed
the 18th Amendment. A month later, President Woodrow Wilson began partial prohibition to
conserve grain to make bread for soldiers and not liquor. Beer was limited to 2.75% alcohol
content and production was held to 70% of the previous year's production. In September, the
president issued a ban on the wartime production of beer.
The wording of the 18th Amendment banned the manufacture and sale (but not the possession
and consumption) of "intoxicating liquors." Many brewers hoped that the ban would not apply
to beer and wine. But Congress was controlled by the drys, who advocated a complete ban on
alcohol. A year after the ratification, Congress enacted the Volstead Act, which defined
intoxicating beverages as anything with more than 0.5 percent alcohol. This meant that beer
and wine, as well as whiskey and gin, were barred from being legally sold.
Enforcing Prohibition
At first, saloons closed their doors, and arrests for drunkenness declined. But the effort to stop
Americans from drinking was doomed. In the aftermath of World War I, many Americans were
tired of making sacrifices; they wanted to enjoy life. Most immigrant groups did not consider
drinking a sin but a natural part of socializing, and they resented government interference.
Prohibition’s fate was sealed by the government, which failed to budget enough men and
money to enforce the law. The Volstead Act established a Prohibition Bureau, but the agency
was underfunded. The job of enforcement involved patrolling 18,700 miles of coastline,
tracking down illegal equipment, monitoring highways for truckloads of illegal alcohol, and
overseeing the industries that legally used alcohol. The federal government never had more
than 2,500 agents enforcing the law. A few states did try to help out. Indiana banned the sale of
cocktail shakers and hip flasks; Vermont required drunks to identify the source of their alcohol.
Congress originally estimated that enforcement would cost $5 million; several years later, the
government estimated enforcement would cost $300 million.
Effects of Prohibition
Prohibition did briefly benefit public health. The death rate from alcoholism was cut by 80
percent by 1921, while alcohol-related crime dropped. Nevertheless, seven years after
Prohibition went into effect, the total deaths from impure liquor reached approximately
50,000, and there were many more cases of blindness and paralysis.
Also, drinkers went underground, flocking to hidden saloons and nightclubs known as
speakeasies (because when inside, one spoke quietly—“easily”—to avoid detection), where
liquor was sold illegally. Speakeasies could be found everywhere—cellars, office buildings,
tenements, hardware stores, etc. To be admitted to a speakeasy, one had to use a password,
such as “Joe sent me,” or present a special card. Inside, one would find a mix of fashionable
middle-class and upper-middle-class men and women. In 1927, there were an estimated
30,000 illegal speakeasies--twice the number of legal bars before Prohibition. Many people
made beer and wine at home.
Before long, people grew bolder in getting around the law. Hardware stores sold cheap stills,
and books and magazines explained how to distill liquor from
apples, from watermelon, even from potato peelings. In
Cleveland, an estimated 30,000 city residents sold liquor during
Prohibition, and another 100,000 made home brew or bathtub
gin for themselves and friends. Since alcohol was allowed for
medicinal and religious purposes, prescriptions for alcohol and
sale of sacramental wine (used in church services) skyrocketed.
People also bought liquor from bootleggers (named for a
smuggler’s practice of carrying liquor in the legs of boots), who
smuggled it from Canada, Cuba, and the West Indies. They sold
the liquor from ships anchored in international waters. Then
they bribed policemen and judges to let them operate freely. The
business of evading the law became a sort of national sport. People had little respect for law
enforcement.
Prohibition not only generated disrespect for the law but had other harmful effects as well.
Most serious was the flow of money out of lawful businesses and into fast-growing organized
crime. In nearly every major city, underworld gangs seized the opportunity to make and sell
liquor and pocket huge profits. Chicago became notorious as the home of Al Capone, a gangster
whose bootlegging empire netted over $60 million a year. Capone’s organization reportedly
had half the city’s police on its payroll. Capone took control of the Chicago liquor business by
killing off his competition. During the 1920s, headlines reported 522 bloody gang killings and
glamorized bootleggers like Capone. Men like him served as models for the central characters
in films like Scarface. They became part of the folklore of the decade.
Conclusion
By the mid-1920s, only 19% of Americans supported Prohibition. The rest, who wanted the
amendment changed or repealed, pointed to a rise in crime and lawlessness that they
considered worse than the problem prohibition had set out to fix. Rural Protestant Americans,
however, defended a law that they felt strengthened moral values. The 18th Amendment
remained in force until 1933, when it was repealed by the 21st Amendment.
Even today, debate about the impact of Prohibition rages. Critics argue that the amendment
failed to eliminate drinking, made drinking more popular among the young, spawned organized
crime and disrespect for the law, encouraged solitary drinking, and led beer drinkers to hard
liquor and cocktails. The lesson these critics derive: it is counterproductive to try to legislate
morality.
Opponents argue that alcohol consumption declined dramatically during Prohibition--by 30%
to 50%. Deaths from cirrhosis of the liver (a disease caused by alcohol consumption) for men
fell from 29.5 per 100,000 in 1911 to 10.7 per 100,000 in 1929.
Was Prohibition a "noble experiment" or a misguided effort to use government to shape
morality? Even today, the answer is not entirely clear. Alcohol remains a serious cause of death,
disability, and domestic abuse. It was not until the 1960s that alcohol consumption levels
returned to their pre-Prohibition levels. Today, alcohol is linked each year to more than 23,000
motor vehicle deaths, domestic violence, and to more than half the nation's homicides.