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What Were The Effects Of Prohibition In The 1920's

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Picture this: its the roaring twenties, people were ecstatic about the war being over, but had no idea that there was about to be a cultural civil war among America starting with prohibition. From the end of nineteen eighteen to nineteen thirty three prohibition had its impractical moments and was controverted , and in the end, it became one of the most prominent moments in U.S history
J.J Little explains that the Eighteenth Amendment made drinking and selling alcohol illegal(598). The meaning of prohibition was to diminish the drinking of alcohol, and therefor the crime rate would plummet, including poverty, death rates, and the condition of life would become better also boosting the economy. Sadly, this was no help at all (Addiction History 1165). The FPB (Federal Prohibition Bureau) began only to over look the Volstead Act and made sure it was …show more content…

These laws, however, were infringed upon often by smugglers and those who were alike. The smugglers would creep their boozes overseas (and some from Canada), take it from the government storehouse, and then make their own. Numerous amounts of people stored their liquor in secret compartments such as empty canes, false books, and whatever else they could create (Al Capone). Illegal liquor stores, or speakeasies, substituted saloons after the beginning of prohibition. The number of speakeasies, just in New York City, toppled over one-hundred thousand by nineteen-twenty five (Al Capone). Even though that sounded like a solid plan, prohibition was easier said than done. With miles of vast coastline (18,700 miles) outnumbering the federal agents (1,550 federal agents) by a ridiculous amount, trying to stop substantial amounts of liquor from gaining access into

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Crooked Agents were bribed to “look away” from people buying liquor. Even workers in the government wouldn’t help with the prohibition, they wouldn’t spend any money on enforcing it. When criminals smuggled alcohol they could easily get away with it because there would be so little patrol at the many miles of the country 's border. (Document C) The men who made the prohibition were not following its rules.

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Temporary fun with lifelong consequences; alcohol. In 1919 the 18th amendment was ratified, this amendment declared it illegal to manufacture, transport and sell alcoholic beverages. America repealed Prohibition due to the crime rate increasing, failure of enforcement and no money being made off of alcohol. Due to the crime rate increasing majorly during Prohibition America had second thoughts on it. The US Census and FBI Uniform Crime Reports in Drug War Facts shows us a graph representing the homicide rate before, during and after the years of Prohibition.

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The country was trying to control America’s alcohol problems by law. The ban on alcohol worsened America’s alcohol problem, in fact, it did quite the opposite of its intention. All caused by prohibition, America had an increased crime rate, death rate, and to top it off, America was losing slathers of money.

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The people found ways to have alcohol even in public view of law enforcement like hollow walking canes, hidden rooms in their houses, and false floors in their vehicles to transport it. Some of the problem was that states and federal authorities wouldn 't commit the resources necessary to enforce the Act. For example, the state of Maryland refused to pass any enforcement issue (The Volstead Act, 2015). The Prohibition agents mostly worried about crossing state lines with the alcohol, possibly because it was easiest to patrol. Making the alcohol illegally was called moon-shining because the hard alcohol that was made was called

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In Document C, it says that the force of the Prohibition Unit of the Bureau of Internal Revenue was about 3,000 to 3,500. This was too meager to control the American population and make sure they obeyed the Volstead Act, which eliminated the consumption of drinks with over 1% alcohol in the United States, and the 18th Amendment. In 1923, approximately 111.9 million people lived in America, which is about one person to enforce Prohibition for 37 thousand people! There was a lack of authorities enforcing Prohibition, therefore, many citizens figured out how to trick the system. According to Document D, Congressmen and Senators continued violating the Volstead Act.

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Why did America change its mind on prohibition? Well it all started on January 16th 1919 in Nebraska when you weren’t allowed to sale alcohol. The state and government are the ones would have the power to pass the laws that requires Americans to obey the Amendment. Place yourself in 1920 if you had the choice to pass the law of prohibition would you? If it was me I wouldn’t because it would save a lot of trouble and arguments.

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Subsequently, the nation realized prohibition was not working and things began downfall. America began to change its mind, repealing the amendment because prohibition was unenforceable, nobody wants it, and legalizing alcohol would benefit our economy. Prohibition was nearly impossible to enforce, and people usually got away with breaking the law. “Smuggling from Mexico and Canada has been successful on a large scale because it is utterly impossible to patrol the thousands of miles of border..”(Haskin 1923)

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The willingness of the officers to enforce the law varied significantly, but in many places officers were willing to turn a blind eye for a friend or a bribe. This hypocrisy was not just limited to the government, but to many other American entities. Grape juice manufacturers would place labels on containers of concentrate with oddly specific warnings, stating that it should not be left in a dark, cool cupboard with yeast for three weeks. Medicinal and sacramental wine were still legal, and consumption of these rose significantly in the first few years of Prohibition. Druggists would generously hand out whiskey prescriptions (often with a small price tag) and people would obtain certification as religious

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The 1920s carried much change in society. Some of these changes were more rights for women, jazz music, and prohibition. The people of the 1920s were disillusioned by society lacking in idealism and vision, sense of personal alienation, and Americans were obsessed with materialism and outmoded moral values (The Roaring Twenties).Cultural changes were strongly influenced by the destruction of World War I ending 1918. America needed to recover and with it youth rebelled against the norms of the older generations.

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This affected families because now people who wanted to drink had to do it illegally and many got put in jail if they got caught. It also had an effect on society with the growing numbers of people who were admitted into the alcohol wards of the hospitals. The Nationwide ban on the production and sale of alcohol during the roaring twenties had a profound effect on the manufacturers, distributors, law enforcement and the public. The Eighteenth Amendment indicates no purpose to confiscate liquors that are lawfully owned. The Amendment is operative throughout all tutorials limits (Decisions of U.S. 4).

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With selling alcohol being illegal, bars suffered; they would either be closed or transformed into speakeasies.” New York was said to have 30,000” secret drinking establishments and illegal selling of alcohol. Prohibition didn’t only take away their income, it also gave the owners a sense of paranoia and mistrust. With the law in place, lots of employees lost their jobs during prohibition, but others found employment in new areas. For example, law enforcement agencies hired additional personnel to enforce the prohibition law.

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Prohibition led to the rise of organized crime and failed as a policy due to many loopholes and large numbers of corrupt officials. Though started with good intentions it was not a good policy because it destroyed jobs and attempted to destroy an industry. These reasons lead to Prohibition’s failure and the repealing of the 18th Amendment in

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Prohibition was a period of 13 years in U.S. history in which the manufacture, sale, and transportation of liquor was made illegal from 1920 to 1933. It was known as the “Noble Experiment” and led to the first and only time an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was repealed. There were many reasons for why prohibition was introduced, one was that a ban on alcohol would practically boost supplies of important grains such as barley. Another was, when America entered the war in 1917, the national mood turned against drinking alcohol.

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This put prohibition laws into constitutional effect and was the start of a new era. The economy, lowering societal issues, lowering crime should have had every reason to occur in theory due to the designated perpetrator being taken away.. What these ideas did not take into account though, was the failure of previous attempts at the same thing. In the 1800s, laws were passed in certain states that aimed to achieve temperance(3). Many of these laws were repealed shortly after they were passed.

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Many people feel that this goal was achieved, but many others disagree and think the opposite. When this law was first talked about, it seemed unrealistic because of how much drinking had been going on. As soon as the new law was put into action, Americans were so angered that the government was preventing them from drinking alcohol, so their willingness to break the law skyrocketed. People robbed stores, killed innocent bystanders, began bootlegging, and this was all in an attempt to rebel against Prohibition. It states on page 361 of the article “Homicide in Chicago from 1890 to 1930”, “The homicide rate in Chicago rose significantly after Prohibition came into force…

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