Dry January? The US had 13 long, dry years
from Catholic and German Lutheran communities.
They were well-funded, but became marginalised because of the First World War, allowing breweries to be closed down in state after state until the snowball effect saw a nationwide ban.
The Volstead Act forbade the manufacture, sale and transportation of “intoxicating liquors”, but didn’t prohibit private ownership and consumption of alcohol.
But other booze outlets were less legal.
Speakeasies sprang up to keep the man in the street’s spirits up, and criminal gangs were quickly able to gain control of the beer and liquor supplies in most cities, notably Chicago and Detroit.
While some argue that crime levels didn’t rise during Prohibition, the wets argued it had the opposite effect, lowering local revenues and imposing “rural” Protestant values on “urban” areas.
Prohibition did reduce overall alcohol consumption by half during the 1920s, and cirrhosis declined proportionately, but the health benefits are dubious, to say the least.
Yes, rates of some alcohol-related illnesses dropped, but that was more than balanced by a rise in hospital admissions caused by bad bootleg booze – such as bathtub gin and moonshine – which the loss of taxes made hard to pay for.
Some 10,000 Americans were killed by tainted liquor before Prohibition was repealed by the 21st AmendmentonDecember5, 1933.