Prohibition
"The reign of tears is over. The slums will soon be a memory."
Reverend Bill Sunday |
On January 29th, 1919, Congress ratified the 18th Amendment which prohibited “the manufacturing, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors...for beverage purposes” (Source: Amendment XVIII)
Controversy
Opposition“Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control man’s appetite by legislation and makes crimes out of things that are not crimes.”
Abraham Lincoln |
"From the mid 1870s to the early 1890s, the Women's Christian Temperance Union was the major organization within the United States seeking Prohibition. Its members utilized rather extreme tactics to convince Americans to abstain from alcohol." |
Support"Men, I have come to save you from a drunkard's fate.”
Carry Nation, a radical member of the Temperance Movement |
“There is not less drunkenness in the Republic but more. There is not less crime, but more. There is not less insanity, but more. The cost of government is not smaller, but vastly greater. Respect for law has not increased, but diminished."
Journalist H.L. Mencken |
"When the Eighteenth Amendment was passed I earnestly hoped...that it would be generally supported by public opinion ... this has not been the result … respect for all law has been greatly lessened."
John D. Rockefeller Jr. |
“The growth of the illegal liquor trade under Prohibition made criminals of millions of Americans.”
Michael Lerner |
Joseph Kennedy and Prohibition
"Kennedy was up to his eyes in illegal alcohol. Leading underworld bootleggers from Frank Costello to ... Lucky Luciano have all recalled for their biographers or for news journalists how they had bought booze that had been shipped into the country by Joseph Kennedy. On the receiving side of the booze business, everyone from Joe's Hyannis Port chums to ... townsfolk who survived the Depression by uncrating [illegal] booze... tells tales of Joe Kennedy's involvement in the illegal trade." |