Twenty-First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution

The Twenty-First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which repealed the Eighteenth Amendment, was passed by Congress on February 20, 1933, and was ratified on December 5, 1933. The Eighteenth Amendment was designed in the late 1910s to prohibit the manufacture, distribution, and transportation of alcohol within the United States; however, a number of unintended consequences resulted from its passage. These consequences, matched with the pre-prohibition attitudes of those groups and individuals who were against the passage and ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment, were just a few of the factors that ultimately led to a significant change in the construct of the Constitution. The organization of interest groups coupled with the political and economic climate of the late 1920s and early 1930s provided ...