This document summarizes Prohibition in the United States and its repeal via the 21st Amendment. It discusses how the Temperance movement led to the 18th Amendment banning alcohol nationwide in 1919. Enforcement of Prohibition spawned organized crime groups like Al Capone's who profited from bootlegging. Prohibition became unenforceable with widespread corruption and deaths from illegal alcohol. It was repealed by the 21st Amendment in 1933 as the Great Depression increased demand for jobs and tax revenue from legal alcohol. Prohibition failed because it turned law-abiding citizens into criminals and was too difficult to enforce while empowering gangsters.

1. Prohibition
&
The 21st
Amendment
MAST HS
US HIS – Period 4
Ms. Richardson

2. 19th Century Background for
Prohibition
• Second Great Awakening sought to
remake society in God's image.
• Thousands of Temperance
societies were formed.
• Successful in reducing
consumption and encouraging
stricter state regulation of alcohol.

3. Volstead Act (1919)
• Provided enforcement for the 18th
amendment (prohibiting the
manufacture and sale of alcohol).
–Alcohol police
• Vetoed [rejected] by Pres. Wilson
• Congress overrode the veto

4. Al Capone & Organized Crime
• By 1927 he was earning some $60
million a year from bootlegging.
• His gang was like a private army.
He had 700 men under his
control.
• He was responsible for over 500
murders.
• Gangsters started to take control
of many cities.
• They bribed the police, judges and
politicians.
• They controlled the speakeasies
and the distilleries, and ruthlessly
exterminated their rivals.

5. The 21st Amendment (1933) –
Reapled Prohibition
• Prohibition was
unenforceable.
• Many deaths occurred from
bootleg liquor.
• Political corruption increased.
• Smuggling grew out of
control.
• During the Depression the
potential jobs and tax
revenue from the legalization
of liquor increasingly
attractive to struggling
Americans.

6. Why did Prohibition fail?
• Otherwise respectable
people became
lawbreakers
• Enforcement was too
difficult
• People in Congress
were breaking the law
• Secret drinking places
(“speakeasies”)
• Money gained from liquor
tax could pay off the
national debt
• Gangsters and
bootleggers profited from
it
• It encouraged disrespect
for all laws
• Increase in the homicide
rate

7. Why did Prohibition fail?
• Otherwise respectable
people became
lawbreakers
• Enforcement was too
difficult
• People in Congress
were breaking the law
• Secret drinking places
(“speakeasies”)
• Money gained from liquor
tax could pay off the
national debt
• Gangsters and
bootleggers profited from
it
• It encouraged disrespect
for all laws
• Increase in the homicide
rate