Why did Prohibition laws prove so difficult to enforce?

Although one would think that prohibition would enhance the difficulty of obtaining alcohol, liquor was actually very easy to acquire. The bootlegging business was so massive that customers could easily obtain alcohol by simply walking down almost any street. Replacing saloons, which were all shut down at the start of prohibition, were illegal speak-easies. These businesses, hidden in basements, office buildings, and anywhere that could be found, admitted only those with membership cards, and had the most modern alarm systems to avoid being shut down. Texas Guinain was female club owner who mainytained her business through the selling of alcohol. Therefore the prohibitionists had not achieved their aim as people could drink anywhere even though it was illegal.

This unpopular law was difficult to enforce because the majority of people didn't agree with the banning of alcohol. People wanted to acquire alcohol and this led to an increase of organization of crime, especially in large cities. As liquor was no longer legally available, the public turned to gangsters who readily took on the bootlegging industry and supplied them with liquor. On account of the industry being so profitable, more gangsters became involved in the moneymaking business. As a result of the money involved in the bootlegging industry, there was much rival between gangs. The profit motive caused over four hundred gang related murders a year in Chicago alone.

The main organisation set up to find criminals such as bootleggers was the Prohibition Bureau. This did not stop the ever-growing alcohol market as many agents were to be known to be on the payroll of big gang members such as Al Capone. He was the world's famous criminal who ran a vast empire of speakeasies, distilleries and gambling houses. By the late 1920's he was earning over $100 million a year, he was never caught for selling alcohol and only went to prison for tax evasion. He didn't even serve time for the St Valentines Massacre where Capone's gangsters murdered seven leading members of Bugs Moran's gang. Gangsters escaped any legal action because of the large briberies they gave to the agents. Many agents were open to these briberies as they were poorly paid and over worked. The agency was not successful as these big time gangsters used their profits to pay off the agents in their area and to maintain the illegal alcohol business, making a mockery of the prohibition laws.

Some prohibition agents did manage to carry out their work conscientiously and closed down many speakeasies. One of the best-known agents was Izzy Einstein who managed within 5 years to confiscate 5 million bottles of liquor and to make 4,000 arrests. Which did show that the Bureau was working but as there were only 1,500 agents for the whole country if proved difficult to keep up with the increasing number of speakeasies across the country by 1933 there was almost 220,000 speakeasies throughout the USA.

As good as the idea sounded, prohibition was far easier to proclaim than to enforce, with only 1,500 federal agents and over 18,000 miles of vast and virtually unpoliceable coastline, it was clearly impossible to prevent enormous quantities of liquor from entering the country. This meant that if the government wanted to make sure no alcohol was being brought into the country they would need people patrolling the area constantly. There was also the fact that the USA population had grown to over 125 million people who all could be potential alcohol drinkers. This made prohibition even more difficult to enforce, as there wasn't enough agents to make sure no one was drinking.

If any one was arrested many juries found themselves being lenient against the prohibition cases because they too were breaking the law themselves. One Jury in San Francisco was found by a judge to be drinking the evidence. No one could really see the effect of prohibition, everywhere you went there was drink to buy. It was increasing difficult to see these laws working as many people in positions of authority were to be seen breaking the law and drinking alcohol. Even President Harding was known to drink and was susceptible to bribes and blackmailing. A law pushed through by so few supporters was bound to fail right from the start.

The results of the prohibition are clear: organized crime grew into an empire and disrespect for the law grew. Also the consumption of alcohol increased during the prohibition era as drinkers became more daring because of the thrill of it. Reasonable measures were not taken to enforce the laws and so they were practically ignored. People openly broke the law and more alcohol was consumed every day, the problems prohibition intended to solve, such as crime, grew worse and they never returned to their pre-prohibition levels. Not only was prohibition ineffective, it was also damaging to the people and society it was meant to help. I feel the main factor that caused the prohibition laws to be so difficult to enforce was the fact that the majority of the USA population didn't agree with it. Only the people in the rural and small towns really wanted this law to be enforced, so many people openly broke the law, as they did not agree with it. I feel this is why the prohibition laws failed and that this law should have never been enforced.

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