Research Paper On The 1920's

After World War 1, America had to demobilize and revert back to a peace time economy. During the 1920’s, it was viewed as a prosperous economy since there was a new labor force due to demobilization, new inventions, and a new infrastructure. Also moral spirits were high since America along with the Allied Powers defeated Germany and the Great War was finally over. However, America began making many economic policies and decisions that will eventually lead up to the Great Depression.

The Prohibition Amendment took effect on January 16, 1920. The eighteenth Amendment outlawed the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol in the United States until it was repealed on December 5, 1933. The excessive amount of alcohol consumed primarily by men often resulted in violence, poor work performance, and wasteful spending of wages on alcohol, which were needed to support their families. Although the Prohibition Amendment did decrease alcohol-related felonies it created more organized crime and an increase of economic problems.

The prohibition caused much controversy in the 1920’s. The 18th amendment was passed on Jan 16, 1920, it said in Title II, Section 3 the National Prohibition Act states that "No person shall on or after the date when the 18th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States goes into effect, manufacture, sell, barter, transport, import, export, deliver, furnish or possess any intoxicating liquor except as authorized in this act." (United States constitution). The Prohibition opened up many big business opportunities in the illegal marketing of alcohol. The people who took advantage of this opportunity were known as “Bootleggers”. With the enactment of this law organized crime was established, allowing men such as Al Capone to capitalize

Between 1900 and 1913 more Americans began to drink more and more alcohol with the production of beer jumping from 1.2 million to 2 billion gallons; three times more alcohol than the average American drinks now.1 Prohibition was a movement sparked by women since women thought they were the ones who suffered the most from the cause of alcohol and women though that alcohol was a threat to a happy family. Women wanted to pass prohibition because many men would go to saloons and go home and be abusive towards their wives and children. Women and other groups eventually got 46 of the 48 states to ratify the 18th amendment on January 16, 1919.2 The 18th amendment on article one says, "...the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited."3 The first article on the 18th amendment is saying that the sale, making, or even bringing liquor into the United States or any of the United States' territory will now be illegal. Prohibition began to show its weakness right away when the United Sates government did not show much support. After the first year of prohibition the American people started to show less support and even led to organized crime. In 1933, the United States Constitution was amended to repeal the 18th amendment in the form of the 21st amendment.4 Even

more. Life was high paced and things that you could experience but this was all after the war.

    Prohibition resulted in unregulated and uncontrollable trade of bootlegged alcohol. Bootlegging resulted in a major decline in the quality of alcohol with the lack of government regulations of the product. An estimated 1000 Americans died annually as a result. Also, the cost only increased at the decade continued. The underground industry overall ran rampant as prices skyrocketed for unsafe alcohol.

Though Prohibition was highly contested as a failure, there were change in lives as alcohol consumption dropped by at least 30%. Resistance was concentrated in ethnic communities where recent immigrants saw no harm in drinking, and among the urban upper classes who were able to afford the high price of bootleg liquor and inclined to regard it as culturally sophisticated to ignore the dry law. Sparked hidden inventiveness as other citizens, both urban and rural, took advantage of Volstead Act loopholes allowing the personal use of wine fermented from natural fruit juices and the prescribing of spirits for medicinal use. “Immediately after the official start of Prohibition in January 1920, problems of day-to-day enforcement surfaced with alarming regularity.” Some saw the demand for illegal alcohol consumption as a business opportunity supplied said demand, thus Organized Crime arose more. Prohibition was intertwined with the culture of the twenties, which introduced a culture steered in rebellion, flappers, speakeasies, and bootlegging. Women were able to rebel against traditional conservation as they had shorter hair, dresses, and

The 18th Amendment was removed from the Constitution and replaced by the 21st Amendment on December 5, 1933. It was added because the government was also suffering from the Great Depression at that time. By removing Prohibition, the government would get taxes from alcohol sales, jobs would be created, and it would decrease the costs of law enforcement for Prohibition. The 18th Amendment was the only amendment that was ever abolished in the U.S. Constitution. An amendment is supposed to stay in the Constitution forever and acts as a law that is protected by the federal government. When the 18th Amendment was removed, it shows that the government thinks that it wasn’t effective. Organized crime made money from selling the alcohol and increased crime throughout U.S. After years, lawmakers agreed that prohibition was not effective but also dangerous to many laws and caused many crimes concerning the safety of the citizens. Thousands were called back to work for alcohol companies. More than 5,000 new jobs are predicted as a result of repeal and many celebrated the downfall of Prohibition. After 13 years trying to stop use of alcohol among the citizens, Prohibition was not success, but rather

Not everyone in the United States agreed with the Nineteenth Amendment being passed. Two months after the Federal Government declared that the Amendment had been incorporated to the Constitution in August of 1920, Oscar Lesser “sued to stop two women [Cecilia Street Waters and Mary D. Randolph] to vote in Baltimore, Maryland. Lesser “believed the Maryland Constitution limited the suffrage to men”. He said that Maryland had refused to vote regarding the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment, and should not be subject to its application.. In 1922, Leser v. Garnett, was argued before the United States Supreme Court. The plaintiffs of the case argued that the Nineteenth Amendment was not passed constitutionally. They claimed there were “three principal grounds” to their argument, which were: that the power to amend the Constitution did not cover this amendment "because of its character"; that several states that had ratified the amendment despite the fact that their state constitutions prohibited women from voting; and that, in particular, the ratifications of the states of Tennessee and West Virginia were were invalid because they were adopted without following the rules of legislative procedure in place in those states”. In a unanimous decision, the court ruled that the amendment was passed constitutionally. In their decision, the court responded to each of the three arguments. Lesser’s first argument claimed that if Amendment’s are added without the State’s consent, it

The making of homemade alcohol, also known as bathtub gin or bootleg alcohol, increased during Prohibition. During prohibition, no one could produce, manufacture, transport, or sell alcohol; so people began making their own, and it wasn’t always the safest thing to drink. People would put any kinds of ingredients in their bootleg alcohol, “bootleg liquor is so concentrated and almost invariably contains other and more deadly poisons than mere ethyl alcohol.” Because no one could produce alcohol, anyone who wanted to could make their own. Homemade alcohol started becoming increasingly popular, and it resulted in many deaths because most of the time it was dangerous to ingest. Deaths because of homemade alcohol started climbing more and more, “the death rate from poisoned liquor was appallingly high throughout the country. In 1925, the national toll was 4,154 as compared to 1,064 in 1920 (Thornton).” Thus, the new trend of homemade alcohol was not a good one. Prohibition influenced this unlawful behavior, and it resulted in an increase of deaths. The approval of the 18th amendment produced many problems that could’ve been

January 1920, the opening year of the 18th Amendment that sought banning “the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors” within the United States and its US territories. Many Americans relate this era with speakeasy, public law breaking, and a public disregard for the establishment of prohibition. The 18th Amendment was the first constitutional amendment that sought to limit the rights of citizens and their rights to drink. This would become an attempt that many would soon come to realize as one of the greatest failures in law enforcement in American History. For if an American wants to drink, those with the American spirit for rebellion will surly offer him one.

The 18th amendment, or the prohibition law was a good and a bad thing for America in many ways. Prohibition was enacted to stop the derotation and violence of men against their wife and kids with the use of alcohol, and many people thought that alcohol was an ungodly corrupted thing in America which is why the 18th amendment was enacted to try to eliminate and dangers of alcohol. Alcohol was prohibited in many states before it became a law in the 1920’s for the whole state. Even though the government and women enacted the 18th amendment to prohibit alcohol to make things better in the US only made things worse and some things good that America’s wouldn’t even know would happen.After America saw what this 18th amendment was doing to the country they saw that it was silly to prohibit alcohol in the first place just to cause a lot of problems in the future which America did unintentionally.

The 1920s was a time of rapid change in the United States. The mood was optimistic as revolutions of manners and morals took place across America. On December 17, 1917 the 18th Amendment was approved by the House of Representatives and the United States Senate a day later. Prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages in the United States, this was called Prohibition. This amendment in the coming years would cause more that ¾ American states to declare themselves dry in 1920s. With prohibition of alcohol spreading congress passed the The Volstead Act which made and drinks with more that 1% alcohol illegal. Years later, after seeing the detrimental effects of Prohibition Congress? Appealed the amendment legalizing alcohol in the United States. America changed it mind of Prohibition for three reasons crime, enforcement and respect for the law, and economics.

The 18th amendment was ratified by congress on January 16, 1919 in which the selling and distribution of “intoxicating liquors” was banned. That was the start of what many called the dry decade in the United States. Norman H. Clark’s Deliver Us from Evil: An Interpretation of American Prohibition illustrates the struggles to make the dry decade possible and the consequences that followed it. The 235 page text describes how the Anti-Saloon League was determined to make prohibition possible and the struggles they had to overcome. As well as what directly followed once it was a reality.

As a result of this new law, a new social problem arose. “Seldom has law been more flagrantly violated. Not only did Americans continue to manufacture, barter, and possess alcohol; they drank more of it.” Americans who supported prohibition, argued that if drinking alcohol was illegal, the public would recognize and respect the law, and in turn, would give it up. During the start of prohibition, it appeared as though it was working. But, what was really going on, was that since the transportation and production was not allowed, bootleggers had to find ways to do it without being caught. The price of beer rose, because it had to be transported in large barrels, which was more difficult. As a result, people started drinking more potent hard liquor. It took less to get drunk, therefore it was easier to transport, thus, it was cheaper. Americans would drink this potent liquor and get drunk a lot faster, for less money. As a downfall, however, the liquor had no standards. The rate of alcohol related deaths due to poisoning drastically increased from 1,064 in 1920, to 4,154 in 1925.