Prohibition: A Very Short Introduction - W. J. Rorabaugh

Category: History, Political
Language: English
Keywords: Alcohol Alcohol-regulation Alcoholism Black-markets Bootlegging Civil-liberties Class Conflict Corruption Criminalisation Cultural Change Cultural Conflict Economic-crisis Enforcement Evangelicalism Federalism Gangsterism Gender-relations Government-regulation Immigration Law Enforcement Legislation Modernisation Moral-panic Morality Nativism Organised Crime political corruption Political-reform Politics Prohibition Prohibition-failure Public Health Public Policy Reform Religion Religious-moralism Repeal-politics Resistance smuggling Social Control Social Reform Temperance Temperance-movement Unintended-consequences Urbanisation

Written by W. J. Rorabaugh
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps

Americans have always been a hard-drinking people, but from 1920 to 1933 the country went dry. After decades of pressure from rural Protestants such as the hatchet-wielding Carry A. Nation and organizations such as the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and Anti-Saloon League, the states ratified the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution. Bolstered by the Volstead Act, this amendment made Prohibition law: alcohol could no longer be produced, imported, transported, or sold.

This bizarre episode is often humorously recalled, frequently satirized, and usually condemned. The more interesting questions, however, are how and why Prohibition came about, how Prohibition worked (and failed to work), and how Prohibition gave way to strict governmental regulation of alcohol. This book answers these questions, presenting a brief and elegant overview of the Prohibition era and its legacy.

With his unparalleled expertise regarding American drinking patterns, W. J. Rorabaugh provides an accessible synthesis of one of the most important topics in US history, a topic that remains relevant today amidst rising concerns over binge-drinking and alcohol culture on college campuses.