A Prohibition in the United States It was in force between 1920 and 1933. During this period, the production, transport, sale, import and export of alcoholic beverages was prohibited in the United States.
Since the beginning of the 19th century, several movements have defended the prohibition of the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages. These movements were mainly linked to churches in the southern United States.
During Prohibition, groups of drink traffickers emerged. Over time, these groups came into conflict over the monopoly of the liquor trade, causing great violence in large North American cities. In 1933, during the Great Depression, Prohibition was repealed.
Read too: How does Dry Law work in Brazil?
Topics in this article
- 1 - Summary of Prohibition in the United States
- 2 - Historical context of Prohibition in the United States
- 3 - What was Dry Law in the United States?
- 4 - Why was Dry Law created in the United States?
- 5 - How Dry Law worked in the United States
- 6 - Problems caused by Prohibition in the United States
- 7 - End of Prohibition in the United States
- 8 - Curiosities about Prohibition in the United States
Summary of Prohibition in the United States
- Prohibition in the United States was the period in which the production and sale of alcoholic beverages was considered illegal.
- Before the federal prohibition law was passed, several cities and states had passed laws prohibiting the production and sale of alcoholic beverages.
- The 18th Amendment, which prohibited the production and sale of alcoholic beverages throughout the territory of United States, was approved by the North American states in 1919 and came into force in January from 1920.
- The Volstead Act was passed by the United States Congress shortly after the passage of the 18th Amendment. The law created the rules for applying the newly created amendment.
- After the 1929 Crisis caused a major recession in the North American economy, Prohibition was repealed in 1933. The objective of the repeal was to improve the economy and tax collection.
Historical context of Prohibition in the United States
Human beings have consumed alcoholic beverages for thousands of years. In Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia beer consumption and wine were already popular across all social strata. The Egyptians even had a big party related to drinking, in honor of the goddess Hathor, the Festival of Drunkenness. On the day of the festival, the Egyptians got drunk all day long, celebrating life.
In America, even before the arrival of Europeans, several indigenous peoples produced and consumed alcoholic beverages made from cassava, corn, agave, among other plants.
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At the beginning of the 19th century The first movements advocating the prohibition of alcohol consumption emerged in the United States, as they consider them harmful to individuals and society. Most of these movements were organized by Protestant churches, mainly from the southern states.
The American Temperance Society, the ATS, was founded in 1826 and began to advocate the prohibition of alcohol consumption. In ten years the entity already had more than 1 million members. In 1874, the Women's Christian Temperance Union was founded, which advocated the prohibition of alcohol consumption to reduce violence committed by husbands.
In 1881 Kansas was the first North American state to prohibit the production, sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages in the United States. But the law was not respected, and several establishments continued to sell alcoholic beverages, with the authorities not monitoring or punishing violators.
At that moment he began to gain fame Caroline Carrier Nation, temperance movement activist who started breaking into bars and destroying bottles and barrels of drinks with a hatchet. She became known as Vovó da Machadinha and became feared by owners of establishments that sold alcoholic beverages. Nation believed he was fulfilling a divine mission when doing this.
After Kansas, other states began to pass similar laws, and the discussion of prohibition reached the North American Congress. During the First World War, the prohibition movement gained strength. The movement argued that the ban would guarantee grains, barley and wheat, mainly, for the war effort.
In 1918 a law prohibiting the temporary production of beverages was passed to secure grain for the war effort. The main drink consumed during the period was beer, and most of the breweries had a German name and owners, so drinking became considered an unpatriotic act.
See too: Facts that marked the history of the United States
What was Prohibition in the United States?
An amendment to the Constitution and a federal law were responsible for prohibiting the sale of alcoholic beverages in the United States. The 18th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified by the US states in January 1919 and went into effect a year later. The 18th Amendment provided for the “prohibition of production, transportation, import or export and sale of intoxicating drinks”, including wine, beer and all types of spirits.
On October 28, 1919, the North American Congress approved the Volstead Act, which was a complement to the 18th Amendment. The law prohibited the production, sale and transportation of drinks that had an alcohol content greater than 0.5%. The law still provided for penalties for those who failed to comply with it, which ranged from fines to prison sentences. The law went into effect in January 1920, along with the 18th Amendment.
Why was Prohibition created in the United States?
Temperance movements argued that alcoholic beverages lead to addiction, causing the person to stop being productive and start living solely based on drinking.
Alcohol consumption was accused of being largely responsible for the high crime rates in the period, domestic violence, work and car accidents, the large number of homeless people, among many other social problems.
How Prohibition worked in the United States
The 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act went into effect on January 17, 1920. On that day, more than 1500 federal agents were responsible for inspecting establishments from different cities across the country. State and district agents were also called in for inspection.
As the prohibition laws were passed in 1919 and only came into force a year later, there was a huge rush in 1919 to purchase alcoholic beverages. Wealthy families bought entire stocks, with the aim of storing drinks to last for years. Many claim that President Woodrow Wilson himself, who was against Prohibition, stocked drinks for the future.
Enforcement of the law required large expenditures for federal, state, and municipal governments. Only in the first six months of the law, more than 7,500 people were fined for non-compliance. In 1921, there were more than 30 thousand.
Lots of people started drinking pure alcohol during Prohibition, which led the government to force companies to add chemicals that made it taste bad and even poisoned. Historian Debora Blum states that more than 10 thousand people died from poisoning for drinking modified alcohol during Prohibition.
Problems caused by Prohibition in the United States
The first major problem caused by Prohibition was economic in nature. With the entry into force of the Dry Law, several factories beer, wine and other alcoholic beverages were instantly closed, causing massive unemployment.
All bars and taverns and various services related to drinks were also closed. alcoholic companies, such as truck drivers, loaders, barrel makers, bottle makers, among several others.
Contrary to what was thought before the law was approved, tourism fell after the approval of the law, as well as profits from restaurants, parks, cinemas and other entertainment-related activities. The federal and state governments also had great reduction in tax collections, since alcoholic beverages had high taxes.
Another consequence of Dry Law was drug trafficking. With the ban, different groups began to traffic drinks from Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, regions where they remained legal. Over time, these groups grew stronger and began to fight for control of trafficking in different regions of the country, generating extreme violence.
Al Capone is the most famous criminal of the period, he and his gang trafficked drinks, mainly from Canada to Chicago, and from there throughout the United States. Drug dealers like Al Capone promoted corruption among the police, members of the Judiciary and part of the press, freely committing crimes such as murdering members of rival gangs.
One of the most famous crimes of the period was the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, committed in 1929. In it, members of Al Capone's group dressed in police uniforms murdered seven people from a rival group.
Most research related to Prohibition highlights that there was a reduction in the consumption of alcoholic beverages in the initial years of the law, but with the growth of the parallel market, consumption rates returned to pre-law levels.
Know more: New Deal — the fight to recover the North American economy after the great crisis
End of Prohibition in the United States
The Crisis of 1929 led the United States economy into a major recession. Several congressmen began to defend the repeal of the 18th Amendment to stimulate the economy, since with its repeal factories would be built, as well as a new transport network, bars and various other services.
In 1919, the year before Prohibition was passed, about 14% of taxes collected in the United States were related to the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages. Repeal the 18th Amendment too It was a way to increase revenue. Thinking about that, Roosevelt signed the Cullen-Harrison Act in March 1933, which allowed the production of beers with up to 4.0% alcohol throughout the United States.
In December 5th the 18th Amendment was repealed by the United States Congress. This was the only time in history that an amendment was repealed in the country. The repeal put an end to Dry Law.
Curiosities about Prohibition in the United States
- When Carrie Nations began destroying bars using her hatchet, one of the attacked bars put up a sign on its facade, “All nations welcome except Carrier”, in allusion to his surname. Over time, several bars in the United States began to display signs with the phrase.
- In 1844, when a Massachusetts town passed a law prohibiting the sale of alcoholic beverages, A bar owner started selling entrance tickets to his establishment so customers could see a striped pig. As a gift, customers could drink freely. This way the merchant circumvented the law prohibiting the sale of drinks.
- Morris Sheppar authored the 18th Amendment of the United States Constitution, the amendment responsible for Prohibition. During Prohibition police discovered an alcoholic beverage factory on Sheppar's farm, in Texas. The factory had the capacity to produce almost 600 liters of drink per day.
- Everyone sick. During the period of Dry Law medicinal use of alcoholic beverages was permitted. Doctors earned more than $40 million just from prescribing whiskeys for treatment in the 1920s. The sale of these prescriptions has created a parallel market for counterfeiters in the United States.
- Everyone religious. During Prohibition, churches and other religious entities could purchase alcoholic beverages which were used in their rituals, like wine. During the Prohibition years the number of registered churches and synagogues doubled in the United States.
- During Prohibition sales of concentrated grape juice quadrupled in the United States. People would let the bottle sit for a few months and the juice would turn into wine, with around 12% alcohol. Some packaging contained a warning for people not to store the juice, so that it would not turn into wine.
Sources
GAZIER, Bernard. The crisis of 1929. São Paulo: L&PM, 2009.
KARNAL, Leandro. The stories of the United States. São Paulo: Contexto, 2007.
MCGIRR, Lisa. The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2015.
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
JUNIOR, Jair Messias Ferreira. "Dry Law in the United States"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/historiag/lei-seca-nos-estados-unidos.htm. Accessed September 20, 2023.
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