What did the Ku Klux Klan, the women's suffrage movement, William Jennings Bryan, Henry Ford, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Eleanor Roosevelt all have in common? They all favored passage of the 18th Amendment, which criminalized the sale of alcoholic beverages.
It is now nearly universally concluded that the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was one of the worst fiascos ever foisted upon our country; moreover, that it was brought about solely by fundamentalist Christians.
The last part is a myth (and to be fair, heavy drinking was a problem in the late 19th-early 20th century). If not, then why would the above groups, who differed on so many other issues and in other respects would find each other repugnant, favor the policy of prohibition? And then, just 15 years later, how did the 18th Amendment become the only one in our nation's history to be repealed? Attached to that, why did the American populace so heavily reverse itself on this issue?
All of these questions demonstrate what a fascinating piece of history prohibition was. And author Daniel Okrent provides the answers in his wonderful book, "Last Call."
Okrent begins by telling the story of how prohibition got started: beginning in the mid-19th century, various church movements and organizations began to lobby for it, albeit with little success.
It wasn't until the turn of the century that the movement really began to pick up steam. This was largely due to the fact that those who favored temperance got organized. Supporters also latched onto an anti-immigrant backlash: most turn-of-the-century immigrants were Irish and German, and were heavy beer drinkers. Additionally, there were brazen appeals to racism.
Once it became law, however, Okrent notes that enforcement was much easier said than done, for a number of reasons:
First, two of the presidents who were in office during this era (Woodrow Wilson and Calvin Coolidge) were ambivalent at best about enforcing it. As for Warren Harding, who died in office in 1923, some in his cabinet members were involved in bootlegging. So were many other politicians at this time.
Second, there were loopholes in the law. For instance, there was a religious exemption for Orthodox Jews; coincidentally, this era saw a large conversion rate to that religion.
Third, just as many opponents of prohibition (most notably former president William H. Taft and essayist H.L. Mencken) rightly predicted, criminal elements would prosper because of it. Okrent records that immediately before the 18th Amendment took effect, Mencken sold his car and used the proceeds to purchase massive amounts of adult beverages.
Fourth, many Canadians started wineries and breweries, smuggled their goods over the borders, and made large fortunes.
Fifth, all of this led to greater corruption in politics. This could be subtle, as when police stationed at the docks would fine bootleggers, who merely counted those fines as part of their production costs. But the corruption could also be overt, as when gangsters such as Al Capone and Meyer Lansky virtually controlled local law enforcement.
So then, what killed prohibition? Okrent gives a number of factors:
First, the aforementioned mob bosses were rightly seen as the direct result of the 18th Amendment. There is little chance that such flamboyant criminals (especially Capone) would have been nearly so successful (and brazenly so) without a nationwide anti-alcohol policy. As this era wore on, more and more people came to that conclusion.
Second, activists like Pauline Sabin began to see the deleterious effects of prohibition. Once a supporter of the 18th Amendment, Sabin especially made it fashionable for women to be politically active in this cause.
Third, publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst tired of prohibition. In the late 1920s, he instructed his newspaper editors to flout the hypocrisy of dry politicians when they were caught with alcohol. This was done to marvelous affect, and helped to reverse public opinion on this policy.
Fourth, when Herbert Hoover was elected president in 1928, he badly misread his mandate: instead of focusing solely on the fact that he was elected to continue the economic policies of his predecessors, he thought it was because prohibition was more popular than it actually was. In his inaugural address, he devoted much heated rhetoric on why anti-liquor laws needed to be tougher, when in fact Americans were tiring of it.
All of that to say, when the stock market crashed in October 1929, the perception that Hoover was out of touch with the nation was magnified even more. So when 1932 rolled around with no end in sight to the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt acutely read the public mood, and ran on a platform of repeal (though he had a history of waffling on this issue).
"Last Call" captures each of these episodes well, which makes it such a compelling read.
Additionally, there are some interesting anecdotes; for instance, Okrent also makes a compelling case that contrary to popular myth, Joseph Kennedy was not involved in bootlegging at all; that such claims only came about in 1960 when his son ran for president.
All told, "Last Call" should go down as one of the best volumes written on this subject. If I do have one criticism, it is this: there is a very heavy reliance upon quotations from that era. While this is helpful in some respects, it makes Okrent's prose a little too choppy.
That once criticism aside, however, I highly recommend "Last Call."
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Top reviews from other countries
KDT
Best general history of US Prohibition that U have read
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 30, 2023Miguel Fontan Dominguez
Un tema extremadamente interesante
Reviewed in Spain on September 28, 2021
Matthew Benson
Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition
Reviewed in Australia on October 24, 2023
Amazon Customer
A great read -- who says history is dull?
Reviewed in Canada on November 14, 2016Davide Berti - Cuneo
Interesting not only about Prohibition but to understand American society and politics.
Reviewed in Italy on January 16, 2017