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| Andrew Volstead |
One Hundred Years ago yesterday, the
Volstead Act, named for the Minnesota representative Andrew Volstead, was ratified by the United States Congress. The 18th
Amendment led to the complete prohibition of “intoxicating liquors”
in the United States. There were seven states
that had not yet ratified the 18th Amendment by that date, but the ¾
majority had been reached. Seven
more states would ratify the amendment between 17 January and 25 February 1919
and New Jersey passed it in March 1922. Connecticut and Rhode Island both
rejected the amendment.
In October 1919
Congress passed the Volstead Act – named after Judiciary chairman Andrew
Volstead who supported the bill – which allowed for Federal enforcement of
Prohibition. Having ratified the
amendment and introduce the Volstead Act, Congress announced that full
Prohibition would be implemented on 17 January 1920.
The 18th Amendment
had grown out of decades of temperance activity and lobbying in the US. One of the prominent temperance leaders was
Protestant, mid-Western spinsters following Carrie Nation, who became a prominent figure
in the movement. She famously led women
into saloons and smashed them up with hatchets and hammers while singing hymns
and quoting the Bible. It is interesting
that Carrie Nation died in 1911, but the movement she becan was driven by many “God
fearing men”.
Volstead of course
was one but there was also Neal Dow and Wayne Wheeler, the head of the
Anti-Saloon League. Then there were
political campaigners who saw in the ‘liquor barons’ and companies the
pervasive hand of capitalism striving to keep the working man sedated with
cheap drink. Remember that the 18th Amendment
did not actually ban the consumption of alcohol merely the manufacture,
distribution and sale of them, but it was aimed as an effective method to put
an end to consumption.
Drinking became an
underground network, so it fell under the control of criminal organizations who
reaped enormous gains from the Volstead Act. With the increasing power of the
mob came a rise in violence, racketeering and bribery. Civil, police, judicial
and political corruption filled the veins of the American system with appalling
results.
Finally In December
1933 Utah became the 36th state to ratify the 21st Amendment
which repealed Prohibition as it would gradually be rolled back across the
country. Not every county in every state repealed their own local limitations
or prohibitions on drinking but it was no longer a Federal business and the
re-ignition of breweries, distilleries and wineries and their various
distribution and sales arms brought an incredible windfall in much needed taxes
into the nation’s coffers. The 18th Amendment
remains the only statute in the history of the US to have ever been repealed.
