Symbolic Crusade

The concept of the symbolic crusade comes from Joseph Gusfield's 1963 book of the same name, in which Gusfield advances the theory that the U.S. movement for Prohibition was not essentially a movement to stop the drinking of alcohol. Rather, it was a class conflict that took the form of a political assault on poor urban immigrants' way of life by the traditional Protestant middle class whose values had dominated the U.S. culture since the early 19th century. Although the book focuses on the temperance movement that supported Prohibition, it is applicable to other movements, social problems, and moral panics that present as crusades but may be a guise for mass social action. Movements supporting “blue laws” or abortion rights are masks for cultural wars; hence, the movements are symbolic.

The American temperance movement started in the 1820s, continued with the founding of the Women's Christian Temperance Union in 1874 and the Anti-Saloon League in 1896, and peaked in 1919 with the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment and the Volstead Act. Gusfield's theory, as applied to the temperance movement, concerns the relations between three main components: (1) temperance attitudes, (2) the organized temperance movement, and (3) the conflict between the different subcultures in American society.

Critical to understanding this historical theory is the difference between the instrumental and symbolic character of law. The instrumental function of law lies in its enforcement; without enforcement, law has little effect on people's behavior. The symbolic aspects of laws and government acts do not depend on enforcement for their effect. Rather, they affect the designation of public norms. A legal decision or legislative act is a gesture that often glorifies the values of one group and demeans those of another. Public affirmation of a moral norm directs the major institutions of the society to its support. Each act affects the status of one group over another. Those who support a current moral norm are seen as having higher status than those who support a moral norm that lacks the support of law.

In the 1820s, the United States was dominated by the old middle class—a white, orthodox Protestant, rural/agricultural culture. Members of the middle class adhered to a value system in which self-control, industriousness, and impulse denial were praised and deemed necessary. They respected temperance norms. Sobriety was considered virtuous and necessary in a community dominated by middle-class Protestants. The New England Federalists, who had held power since the nation was founded, were the political representation of the old middle class. [Page 720]These cultural ideals/norms did not need the support of law because they were accepted without opposition. It is not until a group opposes the norm that the support of law becomes necessary.

Opposing this cultural/class domain were the Irish Catholic immigrants who began arriving in the 1820s, and in the decades that followed, there were successive waves of immigrants from the largely Catholic countries of southern and Eastern Europe. Mass immigration and rapid industrial growth led to a marked increase in the U.S. urban population and, thus, a demographic and political shift that presented a direct challenge to the prestige and power of the middle class. It is against this background that the increasing pressure toward legal prohibition of alcohol can perhaps best be understood.

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