Prohibition Fails!
Before the Prohibition went into effect, it was initially thought that the banning of liquor would trigger economic growth. It was expected that sales for household goods would skyrocket, as would rent prices. Instead, the thousands who worked in saloons and breweries were left unemployed, as well as the businesses they supported, such as barrel makers and truckers. Alcohol abuse, the leading reason for the passing of the Prohibition, increased. Government spending also increased, causing severe financial problems.
"It is my calculation that at least a million dollars a day is paid in graft and corruption to Federal, State, and local officers. Such a condition is not only intolerable, but it is demoralizing and dangerous to organized government. ...
The Government even goes to the trouble to facilitate the financing end of the bootlegging industry. In 1925, $286,950,000 more of $10,000 bills were issued than in 1920 and $25,000,000 more of $5,000 bills were issued. What honest business man deals in $10,000 bills? Surely these bills were not used to pay the salaries of ministers. The bootlegging industry has created a demand for bills of large denominations, and the Treasury Department accommodates them." - Fiorella LaGuardia (Ohio State University) |
"The number of arrests for drunkenness and alcohol-related diseases, like cirrhosis of the liver fell dramatically. The total consumption of alcohol slid to the lowest level in the nation's history, especially during World War I and the first few years under the Eighteenth Amendment."
--(Blumenthal, 124) |