Essay On Prohibition

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Prohibition, the prevention of the manufacture and sale of alcohol in the US, began on January 17, 1920. When the Eighteenth Amendment went into effect Police were given the task of enforcing the law. The passing of this law shocked many. Those against this law had many arguments that showed the harm or inconvenience of this law: including the increase in corruption and crime, the government lacking in revenue that it could have earned from sale of alcohol, and the limits on freedom and rights of the individual. Prohibition was the main goal for many groups like the anti-saloon league and the women temperance union. Those for prohibition believed that alcohol was harmful for many reasons like impacting labor productivity and abuse. They also believed prohibition would erase corruption/crime and to Americanize immigrants, But it was obvious this law would fail . “Congress saw hope in a tax – this time, the return of a federal tax on alcohol. By the time Franklin Roosevelt came out for repeal during the 1932 campaign, it was clear that the 18th Amendment was doomed.” This struggling issue of the 20's was known as “the noble experiment” one that split opinion of the us citizens, prohibition had many reasons to be a controversy but this experiment failed as it should have because the crime rose and it limited peoples freedom and rights. Other bad things came from this and it was not an efficient solution to the things they were trying to prevent. The Public opposition to prohibition was because of many reasons but it was most based on the rise of crime, violating freedom and rights, and alcohol created a large profit for america that we were losing because of prohibition. Many people were against this law because the legal liquor indu... ... middle of paper ... ... more by limiting peoples freedom of speech and also letting crime rise to power. People that agreed with prohibition didn't realize that even without alcohol this issues would still exist, especially because they couldn't truly enforce the law. All that opposed figured out that it would majorly impact americas revenue and peoples freedoms. Also because peoples freedoms were taken away others would sneak around the law causing crime. Even though it was a failure because of america's lack of profit, rise of crime, and the loopholes within the law; it helped create foundations around the subject of alcohol like how it was harder to receive alcohol so americans would drink less and the regulations of the sale of alcohol. Prohibition, The noble experiment, was a failure but it helped us to regulate the situation and lead us to realize the wrongs and rights of this law.

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