Source C was a cartoon published in 1910 by the anti-saloon league, this source is a lot less reliable than A and B because of the fact that it was produced by the anti-saloon league and so therefore will be 100% biased. It was published in 1910, before the war which shows the aspirations of the anti-saloon league and if prohibition was introduced around 1910 I think it could have succeeded because there wouldn’t be many people drinking because the men would soon be going to war and therefore there wouldn’t be much crime because there wouldn’t be a public demand for alcohol, then when the men got back from the war, they would be used to not having alcohol and so would not drink and so therefore prohibition could have worked. The cartoon is exaggerated and uses emotive propaganda, however this is done to prove a point and to try to get the public to support the ban on alcohol.
Source D was also a cartoon; however this was published in 1915, during the First World War. This was also produced by the anti-saloon league and so again will not be very reliable because it will be 100% biased toward the idea of introducing a ban on alcohol. This cartoon was produced in 1915, before prohibition was introduced although during the war, this again shows the aspirations of the anti-saloon league and if prohibition was introduced in 1915, there would have been a lot of public support because it was during the war and there was a concern for preserving grain for food and therefore people would not drink because they would be supporting prohibition. Like the last one this cartoon is exaggerated to prove a point and try to get the public to support prohibition, and also uses emotive propaganda to try to get the point across to the public and works better than source C because it uses children and so people feel sorry for them and think this will happen and so will support prohibition.
The final source that suggests that prohibition may have succeeded is source F, source F was a speech made by John F. Kramer in 1920, before prohibition when Kramer would have been full of hope. Kramer was the first prohibition commissioner; his job was to enforce prohibition. Kramer says “the law will be obeyed” and that “it will be enforced” the language used in this speech shows his commitment and with someone like Kramer in charge it could have worked, there was a whole commission set up to try and enforce prohibition. However this source is not reliable due to the fact that Kramer would have been bias towards his own abilities with no consideration that it might not work. Kramer is determined but 1500 agents is not enough to enforce prohibition across the whole of America, the border between America and Canada is 30,000km long and since alcohol was legal in Canada, it was impossible to enforce prohibition and stoop people smuggling alcohol from Canada. The population of America was also over 100 million and so 1500 agents was defiantly not enough to enforce Prohibition across America.
The anti-saloon league had an impact on the introduction of prohibition, Rockefeller had donated $350,000 to the anti-saloon league before 1920 and $75,000 every year after that. However this wasn’t enough as the best citizens still ignored the ban on alcohol. Although the war gained support for prohibition, by the time it was introduces, in 1920 the war was over and all the public support that had been gained was lost.
Although there are sources that suggest that prohibition could have worked, most of the sources suggest that the failure of prohibition was in fact inevitable. Reasons such as lack of public support, the role of gangsters involved in supplying illegal alcohol shows corruption and shows that the public wanted alcohol, and I know that there were problems enforcing prohibition.
Both sources A and B support that: ‘no other law had gone against the daily customs, habits and desires of so many Americans’. It was clear that the majority of American people wanted to drink and that is exactly what they did. Many people tried brewing their own alcohol illegally and sold it in secret. This clearly opened up a new market in the illegal production of alcohol and people seized the opportunity to make money. As source A tells us: ‘it created the greatest criminal boom in American history’. This was the age of the gangster. Soon speakeasies, which were illegal and secret drinking saloons, were appearing all over major cities and source B confirms that there was: ‘more than 30,000 speakeasies in New York alone’. By 1928 gangsters such as Dutch Schulz and Al Capone were turning prohibition into an ever increasing ‘violent business’. Source G statistics show the activities of Federal Government agents and the growing number of illegal stills increased by 6,048 and gallons of spirits being seized increased by 11,446,000 between 1921 and 1929, clearly showing that more and more alcohol was being produced and suggests that people were even trying to make it themselves in their own homes. However there would not be any need for such vast amount of alcohol if there were not such a high demand for it.
These facts show that the people of America clearly wanted to drink. The statistics in Source H published by the Philadelphia Police Department show how between 1920 and 1925 the amount of drunken related arrests increased dramatically. In 1920 there was a total of 20,410 drink related arrests, which rose to 53,947 in 1923 and increased further to 57,703 arrests by 1925. That’s a total increase of 37,293 drink related arrests between 1920 and 1925 so obviously the American people were continuing to drink and the numbers of those drinking increased throughout prohibition. This increasing demand for alcohol made gangsters richer and more powerful and as source B quotes from Al Capone: ‘all I do is supply a public demand’.
With all the money gangsters were making from alcohol they were able to tackle their biggest problem, the Law. Big gangsters such as Al Capone, who was earning over $100m per year, were able to bribe police officers, prohibition agents, magistrates and judges. Pretty much everyone was corruptible. Even the major of Chicago, Big Bill Thompson, was bribed to turn a blind eye to the activities of Al Capone until he was defeated in the elections for Mayor in 1923. Both sources I and J further proved the corruptness of the police force. Source J, which is a policeman talking about Chicago in the 1920’s, says how he had little choice. If he tried to enforce prohibition they put you in a post where there was: ‘nothing but weeds’. What he meant was that you would be put in a job no one else really wanted to do. Source I further backs up these allegations with a cartoon showing all manner of supposed prohibition enforcers accepting ‘backhanders’ with the title ‘The National Gesture’ showing that the prohibition enforcers were indeed accepting bribes and were indeed corrupt.
In conclusion it is clear that the failure of prohibition was inevitable. Although there are reasons to suggest it might have worked they leave out one important factor. This was that the majority of people wanted to drink and as Sources C and D all too well show alcohol is addictive. America was hooked. Sources A to J combine together to show reason s why prohibition was doomed from the start. Firstly and most importantly too many people wanted to drink. The speakeasies replaced the saloons and by 1933 there were 200,000 known speakeasies in America. The work of gangsters meant that alcohol was readily available and with a population of over 100 million Americans there were not enough agents to enforce such a law. Finally the corruption of the prohibition enforcers meant that most people were allowed to get away with breaking the law and those that were caught were rarely prosecuted.
No good ever came from prohibition and by 1933 all that America was left with were high levels of crime, little respect for the law and a population littered with criminals. Sources A to J definitely support the view that the failure of prohibition was inevitable and can be summed up in one quote written in 1922 by the American novelist Sinclair Lewis:
’course, I believe in it in principle, but I don’t propose to have anybody telling me what to think and do. No American’ll ever stand for that’.
