Presentation Transcript

1. Prohibition
2. In 1830 the average American male over the age of 15 years of age consumed nearly seven gallons of pure alcohol a year. That is over three times what an average person drinks today.
3. This was difficult for women because they had essentially no legal rights and were literally at the mercy of their male counterparts.
4. Many correlated alcohol with abuse! Because men legally could treat women as possessions and women had virtually no recourse for his abusive behavior, the first temperance movements began in the 1830s and 1840s.
5. Temperance Movement The Temperance Movement was an organized effort during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to limit or outlaw the consumption and production of alcoholic beverages in the United States.
6. Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton The Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) would ally itself with the Women’s Rights forces of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Both of which would work tirelessly to promote women’s issues focusing specifically on Women’s Suffrage.
7. Women’s Influence "It largely had to do with the fact that in the 19th century, women had no political rights or property rights. So as the saloon culture began to grow up and we would see men going off to the saloon and getting drunk ... Susan B. Anthony, in the late 1840s, makes her first attempt to make a speech in public life at a temperance convention. This was before she connected with the suffragist movement. She rose to speak at a meeting of the Sons of Temperance in New York, and they said, 'You can't speak. You don't have the rights. Women aren't allowed to speak here.' And that's what pushed her into the suffragist movement. So in fact, you could say that the birth of the suffragist movement comes with the wish to get rid of alcohol."
8. Anti-Saloon League In the late 19th century the Anti-Saloon League was established. This group would become one of the most powerful lobbying groups in American history. Founded in Oberlin, Ohio in 1893 and became a national organization in 1895.
9. Pressure The Anti-Saloon League gathered information and used a great deal of pressure to get legislators to vote in their favor. The League didn’t care if the legislators drank. They cared how they voted. Prohibition was the goal!

10. WWI Makes a Difference!

    People were asked to make sacrifices for the war. Alcohol was one of those things that they sacrificed!
11. German Influence "This was the final thing that enabled the ratification of the Prohibition amendment. You needed 36 states to approve it, and this was happening just as the U.S. was entering World War I. And the great enemy was Germany — and the brewers were seen by the Prohibitionists as tools of the Kaiser. Or if they weren't actually seen as by the Prohibitionists. They were used for that purpose to make their political point. So you have a rising tide of strong anti-German feelings sweeping across the country, and the brewers got swept away with it."
12. Patriotism People wanted to do the right thing for our troops and our country. Brewing beer was a very German thing to do with much of the knowledge concerning it being brought over to the U.S. by German immigrants.
13. In 1919 the 18th Amendment would pass. On January 16th, 1920 Prohibition would go into practice. Within a few minutes after midnight 6 masked armed bandits emptied two freight train cars filled with whiskey barrels from a rail yard in Chicago. There would be similar events that took place in other locations across the country. The practice was not wide-spread but did happen.
14. Volstead Act The Volstead Act provided the country with a law that would allow for the enforcement of the 18th Amendment. There were a variety of loopholes within the law making additional challenges for law enforcement and other concerned citizens.
15. Pharmacists could dispense alcohol. Pharmacists could prescribe alcohol for ailments ranging from the flu to depression. As a results in the state of New York the number of pharmacists would triple during Prohibition.
16. Over 1 million gallons of alcohol were consumed as a result of the prescriptions given by these pharmacists!
17. Church Enrollment Swelled Because wine could be consumed for religious purposes, the churches would see an increased number of people join and attend.
18. Wine Industry The wine industry suffered immediately. One thing the industry did to help itself was to create “juice” kits. In the kit there would be everything on how to make “juice” and then an additional warning telling that if it would be stored too long the “juice” could ferment causing it to turn into alcohol. Sales of the kits soared.
19. Stills The everyday items used to make stills could be easily purchased at the local hardware store.
20. Public Libraries Public libraries would become home to pamphlets that were put out by the Department of Agriculture on the distilling process.
21. Malt and Hops Stores This is a play on “Mom and Pop Stores”. Because it was illegal to manufacture to sell alcohol but not to make a small amount for consumption in the home, “Malt and Hops Stores” popped up across the country selling items to be used in the home manufacturing of alcohol.
22. Prohibition was only on Land This allowed for people to use the waterways to assist them in their alcohol related endeavors. People drank on ships and alcohol was carried on ships. During Prohibition much of the “imports” came from Canada via the Great Lakes.

23. Prohibition

    This came to be called the Noble Experiment. The experiment didn’t work!!!
24. Economic Issues In NY before Prohibition 75% of its tax revenue came from something related to alcohol. Nationally it cost the U.S. government $11 billion in lost taxes and cost the government $350 million to enforce. Jobs were also lost in the distilling and brewing industries as well as those related to them.
25. Judicial Issues Because the court system became inundated with cases there was a need to deal with them quickly. As a result, the courts began to push the plea bargain as a good option. This is the first time in history that it was used to this extent. The plea bargain has continued to be used regularly since!
26. Health Issues More people drank. People drank more. This didn’t stop the situation. It made it worse! Because the demand was high as well as the price, many people got into the bootlegging business.
27. Quality was Low! The term bathtub gin often conjures up glamorous images of flapper girls, speakeasies and the Roaring Twenties. In reality, bathtub gin was the end result of cheap grain alcohols and flavorings such as juniper berries allowed to steep in a tub for several hours or even days. Because the 18th Amendment specifically prohibited the sale or manufacture of distilled alcohol, many producers of bathtub gin were forced to use denatured alcohol which may or may not have been thoroughly processed. A number of party-goers died during the 1920s after drinking contaminated bathtub gin.
28. Cause of Death—Alcohol! During this time period approximately 1,000 people died a year due to the poor quality of the alcohol. Homicide is not figured into this number!
29. Homicide Rates There are two periods of high homicide rates in America. 1920 – 1933 Alcohol Prohibition 1970 – 1990 High enforcement of Drug Prohibition.

30. Federal Bureau of Prohibition was established.

    Essentially that means a police task force that dealt with Prohibition related cases.
31. Prohibition Didn’t Work!!! Ordinary citizens learned from their betters, like George Babbitt, wowed by the casual elegance with which a rich man served him a drink. They heard that Prohibition agents brought confiscated booze to President Harding’s Ohio Gang hangout, the notorious House on K Street. Tales circulated about members staggering drunk on the floor of both houses of Congress. Speakeasys—like what is now New York’s famed 21 Club—ran openly. Puzzled by such easy access to alcohol, visitors to the United States would ask, “When does Prohibition start?”
32. 21st Amendment Passes! State legislatures voted to repeal Prohibition and by 1933 it was over! 3/4th of the Americans wanted it repealed as well as 46 states.