Prohibition in Gasconade County, MO
In the United States, the temperance movement was a movement that preceded prohibition or the 18th Amendment. Beginning in “December 1917, Congress’ opinion of temperance had changed. The proposal for the 18th Amendment was submitted to the states on December 22. By January 1919, ratification by two-thirds of the 48 states was complete.” Most importantly, “prohibition advocates in the early 20th century also relied on racist and xenophobic rhetoric. By connecting alcohol production (and consumption) with German, Irish, Catholic and Jewish Americans, temperance was framed as an “us vs. them” problem. World War I allowed prohibitionists to manipulate growing anti-German sentiment.” This same rhetoric was also seen where the temperance movement leaders “denounced German beer brewers, as well as the brewing industry writ large, as they argued that brewers were intentionally wasting important resources, like grain, coal, and gasoline, in an effort to hurt the US war effort.” Yet, in the city of St. Louis, Missouri the most prolific brewing company, Anheuser-Busch removed every tie or image that might be connected to the nation of Germany on their bottles, advertisement, or any other merchandised products. By April 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt “signed the Cullen-Harrison Act, which legalized the sale of beer containing up to 3.2 percent alcohol by weight.” Nine months later on December 5, 1933, the United States Government signed into law the Twenty-First Amendment ending prohibition once and for all.
However, in the Advertiser-Courier newspaper copy from February 1, 1922, the newspaper reposted a survey that was conducted by “unbiased writers for the New York Herald and other great dailies.” Within this survey, the conductors divided the United States into three sections, the border states, the coast states, and the inland states. In the study, the conductors found that Missouri was one of the wettest states among the inland states, while Kansas was one of the driest states. Additionally, the newspaper article said that “broadly speaking prohibition has been a success, but this cannot be laid to the door of the prohibition agents, but rather to the bootleggers themselves, who adulterate the liquors to such an extent that the average citizen, no matter how thirsty, has become leary of it and refuses to buy.” This newspaper article runs on different ideas than the previous two articles mentioned above because it talks more about a survey that was conducted during prohibition, not on the movements themselves. Lastly, this newspaper article takes a stand for prohibition in that they believe that “there is no doubt that the liquor traffic will die out in the near future, not perhaps altogether but certainly to a noticeable degree.”
Below is a picture of the Advertiser-Courier newspaper from February 1, 1922, in Hermann, Missouri.
