How Alcohol Prohibition Was Ended :: essays research papers

You saved the veryfoundation of our Government. No man can tell where wewould have gone, or to what we would have fallen, had notthis repeal been brought about. -Letter to the VCL, 1933This is a story about a small, remarkable group of lawyerswho took it upon themselves, as a self- appointedcommittee, to propel a revolution in a drug policy therepeal of the 18th Amendment. In 1927, nine prominentNew York lawyers associated themselves below theintentionally-bland name, "Voluntary Committee ofLawyers," declaring as their purpose " to preserve the odourof the Constitution of the United States by bringingabout the repeal of the so-called Volstead Act and theEighteenth Ammendment." With the modest platform theythus commanded, reinforced by their significant stature inthe legal community, they undertook first to draft andpromote repeal resolutions for local and state barasssociations. Their success culminated with the AmericanBar Association calling for repeal in 1928, a fter scores ofcity and state bar associations in all regions of the countryhad spoken unambiguously, in words and ideas cultivated,shaped, and sharpened by the VCL. As it moody out, thissuccesswas but prelude to their stunnung achievementseveral years later. Due in large to the VCL"s extraordinarywork, the 18tg Amendment was, in less than a year,surgically afflicted from the Constitution. Repeal was areality. The patient was well. People could drink. Here ishow it happened. Climaxing decades of gathering hostilitytowards salloons and moral outrage over the generaldegeneracy said to be catamenia from bottles and kegs, theCocstitution of the United States had been amended,effective 1920, to progibit the manufacture and sale of"intoxicating liquors." the Volstead Act, the federal statuteimplementing the prohibitionamindmint, progibitedcommerce in beer as well. At first prohibition was popularamong those who had suppored it, and tolerated by theothers. But before long, un mistakable grumbling was heardin the cities. To meet the uninterrupted demand for alcohol,there sprang up bathtub ginworks and basement stills, tightand distinguishable illegal supply networks, and speakeasiessecret, illegal bars remembered chiefly today as where, forthe first time, women were seen smoking in public.Commerse in alcohol plunged underground, and soon fellunder the control of thugs and gangsters, whoseorganizations often acquired their merchandise legally inCanada. Violence aften settled commercial differences-necessarily, it might be said, as suppliers and distributorswere denied the services of lawyers, insurance companies,and the civil courts. On the local level, widesspreaddisobedience of the progibition laws by otherwiselaw-abiding citizens produced numerous arrests. Courtswere badly clogged, in large part because nearly alldefendents demanded jury trials, confident that a jury of