"Such a movement seems at once naïve, intolerant, saintly, and silly"

After a search in the California State University, East Bay – Hayward Campus library for prohibition information, I wound up bookless. I believe this is because one of my fast-acting peers got the jump on the literature I thought would be helpful and necessary. So, I decided to listen to Professor Ivey after all, and see what I could find through the internet. Let’s face it: I am not the foremost authority on the prohibition era. I simply have an interest in it, because I find the idea behind it preposterous. Until I searched the internet, the only conclusion I had come to about the era, besides that it must have been unfortunate to come of age in, was that speakeasies were like mullets: business in the front, party in the back.

Research proved fruitful when I came across my first source, Symbolic Crusade: Status, Politics, and the American Temperance Movement. My favorite quote was, “legal measures taken to enforce abstinence display the reputed American faith in the power of Law to correct all evils… Such a movement seems at once naïve, intolerant, saintly, and silly.” Whether or not you agree with the use of alcohol, this statement rings true.

Before American women received their right to vote in 1920, their only means of control was influence. They could raise their children and turn the heads of their husbands, which some women were more than happy with. Others found this unfair and unlawful. The temperance movement began to sweep the young nation in the late 1800s, mainly taking hold with women. This small amount of power they could gain through the movement seemed wonderful to many women, especially women with husbands who came home long after dark, having spent all of their money at a bar. Even with the long temperance movement, prohibition of alcohol was not made legal until 1919 with the 18^th Amendment. There was immediate social backlash. Saloons were only allowed to serve non-alcoholic beverages, completely defeating their purpose. Wineries were allowed to continue, but only under certain circumstances, which led to most shutting down. Many citizens were fined and/or put in jail for “crimes” that were so recently considered legal. People were outraged that what they felt was their right, was being taken away by the federal government. Everett V. Abbott wrote in the February 1920 edition of the Columbia Law Review, “the men who voted for the prohibition amendment in our state and federal governments did not possess the authority which they arrogated to themselves. They were bound by limitations [which] deprive their act of any legislative or constitutional validity.” He considered drinking whatever he wished to drink to be an unalienable right. This thought links closely to the question of whether or not government should be able to ban drugs. Though I am getting slightly off topic, isn’t alcohol, in fact, a drug as well? If the government tries to take away what its citizens ingest, is that unconstitutional? And is it in fact an unalienable right? Or if a group of Americans decide that something is in the best interest of the population, should the entire population be held accountable for following a law? Just some food for thought, and come to your own conclusions as you read on.

The 18^th Amendment was passed just one year before the 19^th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote in all elections throughout the country. This may be the biggest reason Prohibition lasted as long as it did. Despite plenty of negative response, alcohol was not legal again until 1933 with the 21^st Amendment. According to Alan E. Wiseman and Jerry Ellig, research shows that, “contrary to the intentions of temperance advocates… the 18^th Amendment was not overwhelmingly successful at reducing general alcohol consumption, as indicators such as cirrhosis of the liver (Dills and Miron 2004; Miron and Zwievel 1991) and rates of drunkenness arrests (Dills, Jacobson, and Miron forthcoming) did not consistently decrease in the advent of prohibition.” Locally, vineyards were suffering. Only a handful of Californian wineries made it through the era.

The 18^th Amendment prohibited “intoxicating liquors,” with exceptions made for religious purposes. As I stated in a previous blog, this was how the Concannon Vineyard was able to stay open through the 1920s and beyond. In fact, making church wine was the initial reason behind the family winery.

Could Prohibition have had something to do with the onset of the Great Depression? I found an article while at the Livermore Heritage Guild looking over the microfilm of the Livermore Herald from 1914. Remember, this is before the 18^th Amendment, but during the temperance movement. The title of the article was, “The Question of State-Wide Prohibition: California Has More at Stake Than Any State in the Union.” It highlighted many interesting, thought-provoking numbers. The subtitles practically pop off the page, announcing their paragraphs. “15,000 People Employed,” “$85,000,000 Invested,” “42,000,000 Gallons of Wine,” “Injury Would Be Permanent,” and “Taxes Would Be Higher,” all jump at the reader to entice interest. This political article probably caught the interest of all who opened the paper that week. With so many jobs and investments tied to wine, it is no wonder I found so many articles in the Livermore Herald announcing local fines and arrests related to liquor. After some struggle, I have managed to upload a jpg file of this article, scanned in from microfilm, compliments of the Livermore Heritage Guild.

Stay tuned for more updates. If you would like to give feedback or you see something that you believe is a typo or just plain wrong, please feel free to tell me. I know there is always room for improvement. Or if you just have any questions, those are fine, too. Enjoy!