The Failure Of Prohibition In The 1920's

What was meant to solve all of America's problems only did the opposite, resulting in a bigger mess to clean up. The Prohibition Era was a failure, not only did alcohol become more dangerous to consume, but crime increased and was organized, while corruption became rampant.
Alcohol became more dangerous to consume once denaturing occurred; a solution introduced by anti-drinking forces in which toxic chemicals were added to discourage commercial-recreational use, turning it into practically poison rather than a beverage. Bootleggers who saw it as stronger and cheaper alcohol would then attempt to re-purify the denatured alcohol so that it could be consumed. Repurifying made no difference being the denatured alcohol would consist of methanol, drinking methanol can lead to blindness, respiratory paralysis or death. When large-scale fatalities occurred as a result of the policy such as incident in which “33 people in Manhattan died in three days, mostly from

Small-time street gangs were provided the opportunity to feed the need of Americans demand for illegal alcohol. “By the early 1920s, profits from the illegal production and trafficking of liquor were so enormous that gangs learned to be more “organized” than ever, they bought breweries that were closed because of Prohibition and hired experience brewers. They ran boats out into oceans and lakes to buy liquor from other countries, leading to the term “rum running.” Paid individual citizens would operate stills at home to make gallons of bad-tasting booze. Thousands of Mob-owned illegal bars known as “speakeasies sold illegal beer, watered down whiskey and sometimes “rotgut” which was poisonous.” This organized crime also gave way to “inter-gang rivalries, shootings, bombings and killings that would shape the 1920s and early ’30s. More than 1,000 people were killed in New York alone in Mob clashes during Prohibition.”