Sober forever? The US tried that once and outlawed alcohol. It didn't go over well
- Prohibition in the United States, which lasted from 1920 to 1933, banned the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcoholic beverages.
- The movement was fueled by moral and religious objections, as well as anti-immigration sentiment.
- While alcohol consumption remains a public health concern, a nationwide prohibition is unlikely to happen again.
At 12:01 a.m., Jan. 17, 1920, America was cut off.
Saloons closed their doors. Taps stopped flowing. People stockpiled their whiskey, beer and wine to weather the dry spell that would last 13 years.
But the short-lived ban on alcohol production and sale, known as Prohibition, would come to be remembered as causing more harm than good. While its intention to limit consumption may have been successful, it also created a boon for mobsters who made a killing on bootlegged booze, exploited anti-immigrant sentiment, and unleashed a torrent of unregulated alcohol that harmed and killed Americans.
One hundred and five years later, here's what you need to know about the not-so-dry history and sobering reality of mandatory temperance in America.
Why did Prohibition happen?
Though it was not illegal to drink or privately consume alcohol, the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution did outlaw the sale, manufacturing and transportation of "intoxicating liquors."
Decades before the 18th Amendment was ratified in 1919, the temperance movement sought to restrict alcohol on moral and religious grounds. The effort was headed by protestant Christian groups and women's groups fighting against domestic abuse.
For years, some states implemented their own restrictions and bans on alcohol. During World War I, the country got its first taste of temperance as concerns over grain shortages and anti-German sentiment grew, leading to the Wartime Prohibition Act signed into law in 1918. Though it was supposed to be temporary, it was seen as a victory for prohibitionists vying for a long-term ban.
Michael A. Lerner, a historian and author of "Dry Manhattan: Prohibition in New York City", told Paste BN the temperance movement was not rooted in just moral superiority, but also anti-immigrant and racist sentiments during mass immigration in the early 20th century.
"Prohibition was never really about alcohol," he said. "It was about trying to define who was American."
Alcohol consumption was common among Irish, Italian, Catholic and Jewish cultures, said Lerner. White Anglo-Saxon Protestants used racist stereotypes about immigrants and alcohol to limit their access to it and isolate them from their communities and cultures.
"Immigrants were scapegoats. This was a test: Who made the cut? Who fit it? Who was respectable?" Lerner said. "Prohibition was a huge amount of anti-immigration sentiment masked as, 'We're trying to deal with the social problem'" of excessive drinking and growing cultural tensions.
Gangsters, bootlegging and speakeasies galore
The mandatory closing of saloons and bars led to the rise of secret nightclubs and liquor stores where liquor flowed free. Hundreds of thousands of speakeasies operated during the era, according to the New York Historical museum.
"I don't think people really wanted to see it enforced universally," Lerner said. "Everyone knew how to get their supply."
Banning the highly-sought beverages created a lucrative business of unregulated bootlegged alcohol and prompted a rise in high-end, top-secret establishments, many of which were operated by mobstersm such as Al Capone. According to The Mob Museum in Las Vegas, the infamous gangster made more than $1.3 billion a year in today's dollars from illicit activity while giving out millions in payouts to law enforcement who allowed him to operate.
Tainted liquor was responsible for tens of thousands of deaths, including some by the U.S. government after they mandated toxic additives to ingredients that were used for bootlegging.
Could Prohibition happen again?
After years of witnessing the backlash from the "Noble Experiment" and enduring the hardships of the Great Depression, the public's support for Prohibition declined.
In June 1932, prominent financier, lifelong non-drinker and Anti-Saloon League supporter John D. Rockefeller, Jr. recanted his support of Prohibition in a letter published in The New York Times.
"When Prohibition was introduced, I hoped that it would be widely supported by public opinion and the day would soon come when the evil effects of alcohol would be recognized. I have slowly and reluctantly come to believe that this has not been the result," he wrote.
He continued: "Instead, drinking has generally increased; the speakeasy has replaced the saloon; a vast army of lawbreakers has appeared; many of our best citizens have openly ignored Prohibition; respect for the law has been greatly lessened; and crime has increased to a level never seen before."
President Franklin Roosevelt campaigned for the presidency on a platform of repealing Prohibition and won in an electoral landslide against incumbent President Herbert Hoover.
On Dec. 5, 1933, the 21st Amendment was ratified, repealing the 18th and handing the power to regulate alcohol back to the states.
One hundred and five years after its implementation, and 92 years after it was repealed, alcohol consumption remains a controversial issue in the U.S. Earlier this month, the U.S. Surgeon General called for alcoholic beverages to have cancer warning labels following years of growing links between alcohol and an increased risk for cancer.
Though a majority of Americans said they drink alcohol, according to a 2023 Gallup survey, that appears to be changing for the younger generation.
Nearly 70% of 18- to 24-year-olds prefer marijuana to alcohol, according to data from cannabis research firm New Frontier Data. And a growing movement towards experimenting with sobriety could signal a shift in alcohol culture.
With growing concerns over the damage of alcohol and its waning use, could there be a Prohibition 2.0? Lerner is skeptical.
Today, alcohol regulation is largely left to the states, including the hours and days stores can sell it, the legal percentage at which it can be sold, whether it must be sold at state stores or can be sold privately and whether minors are permitted to drink it when they're with their parents.
"Our relationship with alcohol is always evolving," he said. Despite the stereotypical American belief of refusing government intervention, "common sense regulation is something Americans support, but they worry when things go too far."