Prohibition

Temperance Movements

Americans drank alcohol routinely in the first half of the 19th century. Beer and whiskey offered a cheap and widely available alternative to unsafe water, and men, women, and children drank alcohol with their breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Laborers and farmworkers took regular breaks to drink a bit during the day. And alcohol flowed freely at celebrations and gatherings. Alcohol was plentiful, but social norms prohibited people from appearing drunk in public, so the extent of drinking problems is unknown.

During the religious revival of the mid-19th century known as the Great Awakening, the first temperance movements in the United States focused on convincing people to moderate their own drinking. Temperance societies spread across the United States and the goal of these societies shifted from moderation to complete abstinence. In 1840, six men met to form the first Washingtonian Society, an organization in which men gathered to tell their own stories of drunkenness, to find support from others, and [Page 552]to sign a pledge promising total abstinence. Women formed auxiliary societies and engaged in some of the earliest women's political activism. Leaders like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton linked temperance with women's suffrage and antislavery movements. And by 1851, the teetotalers achieved a clear win in the declaration of Maine as a dry state. However, the start of the Civil War in 1861 took attention away from the temperance cause, and the movement went dormant for several decades.

Following the close of the Civil War, new immigrant groups from southern and central Europe began moving to U.S. cities, bringing with them new drinking habits. Similarly, working-class men began moving to cities to work in factories. As city populations swelled, the saloon emerged as an important social and political space for immigrant and working-class men. In the saloon, men could escape the workday and a crowded home. They could meet with veterans, unions, and immigrant societies. They could network to find jobs, learn English, and even cast a ballot for elections. Also, saloons often offered opportunities for vice, such as prostitution and gambling.

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