PROMOTE MORAL
DEVELOPMENT
Some reformers
felt that the
answer to
societies
problems was
personal behavior
By the early 1800s… There was a lot of liquor around here
A barrel of hard cider sat by the door of thousands of
farmhouses, available to everyone in the family.
.. Until well into the 19th century, most people, including doctors,
considered alcohol nutritious and healthful...hard liquor was
cheap and readily available, unlike milk, coffee and
tea…Particularly in the 19th century, the consumption of liquor
was a regular daily activity for most Americans, including
children. Adults drank at home, at work and at play, usually
every day and often all day
~ Campbell, Robert A.
Demon Rum or Easy Money
In many cities, the tolling of a bell at 11 a.m. and again at 4
p.m. marked “grog time,” when workers were granted an
alcohol-soaked break.
 Most customers were men who passed through the swingdoors to join their male comrades in the bar- room
 HOWEVER many saloons also had a side door known as
the 'ladies' entrance'.
Until 1900, saloons were open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
Temperance Crusade
def: the movement against the sale of alcohol.
** supported Prohibition
def: law to prohibit the making and the sale of
alcohol.
Many in the movement wanted an outright ban on all alcoholic
drinks, including beer, wine, and hard liquor. They saw alcohol
as a source of social problems including violence, crime, and
poverty
Women’s Christian
Temperance Union (WCTU)
Anti-Saloon League
Anti-Saloon League Campaign, Dayton
At First - Pledged to stop drinking hard or
distilled spirits, such as whiskey and gin only
(toxic to body and soul)
*Some wine and beer had healthy benefits
(not counted) nor was the wine in the
Communion
 Later, it became more popular to give up
alcohol totally or to become a "teetotaler."
- was signed in a public meeting and
witnessed by all the people present.
This was an important to the movement
WHY? Making a public declaration
reinforced its importance and made it
more difficult to reverse. Those who
witnessed your actions were often
available later to give you strength in
keeping your word.
Display as a reminder…
SIGNED PLEDGES TO STOP
DRINKING ALCOHOL.
The Ten Dialogues on the Effects of Ardent Spirits (1831?)
~ Transcription ~
Dialogue III
Pp. 9-12
James: I have been with Father to the prison; don't you wish you had gone with us?
Philip: I do not know; what did you see there?
James: We saw a great many men shut up in the rooms, the doors of which were three or four
inches thick, and large nails or spikes driven through them, with flatted heads, and so close
together that they almost touch each other. The doors were locked with a padlock so large that
I could hardly have carried it. The windows had bars of iron in them crossing each other, and
so near together that a child could scarcely creep through; and the rooms were so dark and
gloomy that we could but just see how dirty and frightful they looked.
Philip: Why were the men shut up in those ugly rooms?
James: I do not know, father did not tell me. Wont you tell us, Pa?
Father: Some were put in the prison because they had stolen, some for having robbed others;
one or two because they had committed murder; and some for other crimes.
Philip: Father, what made those people do such bad things?
Father: One half of them were led to their crimes by the habit of using strong drink. Drinking
men are apt to become poor and lazy, and then they will steal and even rob, instead of laboring
to earn their bread. They are easily made angry when drunk, and then they will curse, and
swear, and even strike their fellow-creatures, and even kill them.
James: When the men are shut up in the prison for their crimes, how long have they to stay?
Father: That depends on the nature of their crime. Some remain three months, some six
months, and some a year. Some are sent from this prison to another, called the States Prison,
and are there shut up in a little dark cell where you could not see your hand, and are allowed
nothing to eat or drink but bread and water. Some are forced to remain for ten years, some as
long as they live; while others, instead of being sent to the States Prison, are hung by the neck
till they are dead, and then the surgeons cut them to pieces.
Philip: Do they ever hang people for drinking rum?
Father: No, my son; but sometimes men are hung for the crimes they are led to commit by their
having drank ardent spirits. I will relate to you a most dreadful instance of this kind. A man who
had a wife and a number of small children, not having been taught by his parents, when he
was young, that he never ought to drink rum, got into the habit of using it a little. It increased
upon him by degrees, until he was often absent at the tavern home later than usual, he tried to
open the door of his house, but found it fastened. Believing hat the was locked out by his wife,
who had often remonstrated with him about his conduct, he, in a rage, suddenly formed the
resolution, and set fire to the house, and burnt it to ashes, with his wife and children all in it.
The man confessed his crime, and was hung.
 From a book of The Ten
Dialogues on the Effects of
Ardent Spirits
 Members of an imaginary
temperate family consisting
of Father, Mother, James,
Thomas, and Philip.
 Each dialogue contains a
graphic story about the
effects of alcohol
 Kept in a chapbook (pocket size)
III  James and Philip discussing James' recent visit with their father to a prison.
James relates the squalid conditions of the prison:
• the doors  locked with a padlock so large one could hardly have carried it
• the windows with "bars of iron in them,"
• the rooms so dark and gloomy
The boys asked their father why the men were shut up in those ugly rooms. The
father's reply was that one half of them were led to their crimes by the habit of
strong drink.
Focus on domestic:
conditions within marriage,
including desertion,
domestic violence, adoption,
neglect
and abuse of children, and
divorce
Women’s Christian Temperance
Union (WCTU)
 Founded by
Annie Wittenmyer
 November 1874 in Cleveland, Ohio
 Organized by women who were concerned
about the destructive power of alcohol and
the problems it was causing their families
and society
 Based itself upon Christian moral principles,
such as sobriety and abstinence (selfdiscipline)
 Some called for the addition of women’s
suffrage (right to vote) to the group’s
platform along with abstinence from
alcohol.
 In 1879 Wittenmyer, who opposed such a
move, was replaced by
Francis Willard
W vs.
W
Carry Nation
Born 1846
Father – Plantation Owner
.Spent much time with the Bible
In 1867  married a young physician, Charles Gloyd
- Heavy drinker
- Had a child (sick)
Carry attributed to her husband's drinking
Left him (drinking and inability to earn a steady living)
- he died six months later.
To survive, Carry turned to teaching and keeping rooms
In 1877, Carry married David Nation, a preacher, attorney and editor
…moved to Kansas
- saw to the needs of poor people, became a jail evangelist and helped
to establish a local chapter of the WCTU.
Why does she have a hatchet?
Kansas residents had voted for prohibition,
BUT saloonkeepers ignored law
Carry began by praying …then rocks and bricks… turned to the hatchet
Her behavior provoked a tremendous uproar
- sent her to jail repeatedly for disorderly conduct and disturbing the
peace.
She also had eloquently speaking her mind and inspiring others
Anti-Saloon League
 Founded in 1893 in Oberlin,
Ohio
 1895 - the League became a
powerful national organization
 Was a non-partisan organization
that focused on the single issue
of prohibition
As time progressed…It was no longer
enough to warn individuals of the danger
of alcoholism.
Drink was increasingly seen as a
problem of the whole society, not just a
personal danger.
 WCTU poster
 In 1913 Anti-Saloon League
announced its campaign to
achieve national prohibition
through a constitutional
amendment.
- Anti Saloon League allied with
the Woman's Christian
Temperance Union
 1916 - oversaw the election of
the two-thirds majorities
necessary in both houses of
Congress to initiate what
became the 18th Amendment to
the Constitution of the United
States
Another cause – Women’s
Suffrage Movement
Began in 1848 first women’s rights convention was held
in Seneca Falls, New York.
For the next 50 years, woman suffrage supporters worked
to educate the public about the validity of woman suffrage
Two ladies above were the best
known leaders of women's
suffrage (voting rights)
Later that year, Lucy Stone,
Julia Ward Howe, and others
formed the American Woman
Suffrage Association (AWSA).
 By 1896, women had gained
the right to vote in four states
(Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho,
and Utah).
 Women and women's
organizations also worked
on behalf of many social and
reform issues.
 By the beginning of the new
century, women's clubs in
towns and cities across the
nation were working to
promote suffrage, better
schools, the regulation of
child labor, women in unions,
and liquor prohibition.
 Not all women believed in equality
for the sexes.
 Those who upheld traditional gender
roles argued that politics were
improper for women.
 Some even insisted that voting
might cause some women to
"grow beards."
However, not until
the passage of
the Nineteenth
Amendment in
1919 did women
throughout the
nation gain the
right to vote.
Fostering Efficiency
Many Progressive leaders put their
faith in scientific principles to make
society better
In Industry:
Frederick Taylor began using
time & motion studies to
improve factory efficiency
Taylorism (Scientific
Management) became an
industry fad as factories sought
to complete each task quickly
Fostering Efficiency
In Industry
Frederick Taylor
began using time &
motion studies to
improve factory
efficiency
Taylorism (Scientific
Management)
became an industry
fad as factories
sought to complete
each task quickly
Progressivism & Eugenics
Many early progressives
advocated eugenics (def:
human engineering), to purge
society's gene pool of
undesirable traits.
 “the
betterment of the
human race.”
Progressives generally shared in common the view that
government at every level must be actively involved in
these reforms.
Eugenics was compatible with the progressive
era's faith in science, the future, the regulatory
potential of the state, and human perfectibility.
Scientific knowledge - mediator of humankind's
secular [material] problems
Fitter families & better babies
Eugenics would
enable parents
to focus their
resources on
fewer, better
children
Going to the court…
 By 1927, the U.S. Supreme
Court had accepted the
progressive belief that the
state ought to be empowered
to determine who should and
should not be permitted to
reproduce.
 Oliver Wendell Holmes, the
Court's progressive icon,
wrote in 1915 that his
"starting point for an ideal for
the law" would be the
"coordinated human effort ...
to build a race."
BUCK v. BELL
Carrie Buck
*Judged to be
“feeble-minded”
and
promiscuous
(slept around)
Reality…
 “We
have seen more than once that
the public welfare may call upon the
best citizens for their lives. It would
be strange if it could not call upon
those who already sap the strength
of the State for these lesser
sacrifices, often not felt to be such
by those concerned in order to
prevent our being swamped with
incompetence. It is better for all the
world if, instead of waiting to
execute degenerate offspring for the
crime or to let them starve for their
imbecility, society can prevent those
who are manifestly unfit from
continuing their kind.... Three
generations of imbeciles are
enough.” ~Oliver W. Holmes
All told, some 60,000 Americans were sterilized by the
decrees of state governments
Last Topic…
Local, State,
and Federal
Government
Reforms