Prohibition Essay

All of the sources could be split into three sections over here. Sources that would Agree, disagree or in the middle that the failure of the prohibition was inevitable. Source A agrees with the fact that the failure of the prohibition was inevitable because government introduced prohibition and this destroyed the foundation of America. The government introduced a law which ignored of American desire and daily habits. It says “For no earlier law had gone against the daily custom habits and desires if so many Americans”.

The government introduced prohibition to America but they didn’t realise they made a big mistake. It created the biggest criminal boom as they were addicted to alcohol. The citizens of America acted like children’s as when they took away alcohol they tendency for it increased and it created serious criminal boom. This source A is from an American history book which was published in 1973 and even though this is not a primary source this could be trusted because this is written almost 50 years later so it would not be biased.

Source B also agrees to the fact that prohibition was inevitable because even though the government pressurised to make prohibition a success by introducing the first prohibition commissioner and bringing in 1500 agents, they banned alcohol manufacture transportation and sales completely. By the time the Commissioner and the agents started their work the bacteria of alcoholism spreaded the whole America. By 1928 there were more than 30,000 speakeasies in New York itself. With the Power and wealth of Al Capone and the people addiction it was almost impossible to make prohibition a success.

Al Capone’s success was the people as he stated “Prohibition is a business and all I do is supply public demand”. Al Capone turned prohibition a business from which he extracted money and most of the government officials were all under the control of Al Capone. Source A and B agrees to the fact that the failure of prohibition was inevitable whereas Source C and D Disagrees with this fact. Source C and D are posters of prohibition as these poster explains the consequences of what could happen to the families and to their own lives once they are under the addiction of alcohol.

The first poster show how a man pays off his due in the Saloon. In the poster it said “Poor man’s club”. It keeps its members and its families poor. This poster was published in 1910, 10 years before prohibition was introduced as this shows that the poster was published as awareness for the people to get out of this addiction and this does not worked out as we know. Source D also had a similar message. There are two kids staring towards a saloon and saying “Daddy’s in there and out shoes and stoking and food are in Saloon too and they will never come out”.

The government was sending out messages to people to the consequences it can bring but the people did not care. If they did then they wouldn’t have to introduce prohibition. This poster was published in 1915, 5 years before prohibition but still made no difference to peoples opinion about alcohol. These both sources do not support the fact that the failure of prohibition was inevitable because this both posters were trying to bring awareness to the people. The next source is E, which is a letter written in 1932, by John.

D. Rockefeller, Jr. nd this source is in the middle in terms of whether the failure of prohibition was inevitable because at the beginning he had the hope that the prohibition would be a huge success as he said “I hoped that It would be widely supported by public opinion” but then he came to reality when he said “reluctantly” he had to believe that it has not been a success. Even the best citizens have ignored prohibition. Prohibition worked as a reverse psychology for the people as this law was brought into to stop alcohol but by this the general demand for alcohol increased tremendously.

The next source F is by john F Kramer, the prohibition commission speaking in 1920. This source disagrees about the failure of prohibition was inevitable because this was told in 1920 when prohibition was introduced and this was his job to enforce this law and obviously he could not be pessimistic about this because this is his profession and he would not say anything that would affect his position. He said “Where the law is not obeyed it will be enforced” but as we know this has not been the case.

This source is biased because it should be considered that if he didn’t make that speech his job would have been lost. Source G and H are statists showing the gallons of spirits seized and arrests in Philadelphia for drinking related offences. In both the sources the number are very encouraging showing that the probation agents had a huge impact in closing down illegal stills the information is provided by the police department and by the federal government.

As we know that by this time both of this sector were corrupted and were under Al Capon’s control. So these two sources could not be trusted completely as it seems a bit optimistic about its figures as by 1929 ” 11,860,000″ gallons of spirit were seized. The next source I relates in with the last source because it is a carton of several high position people standing with their hand opened for receiving bribery. It shows that from Prohibition commissioners to the politicians were asking for bribery and corrupted.

Most of the high status people were corrupted and that is the reason why I concluded that the last source was not to be trusted completely this was from the time of prohibition so it is a primary source and it could be trusted as it showing the truth to the people. The next and the final source is from a police talking about Chicago in the 1920. This is at the time of prohibition so it is primary source. This source says that how the people were corrupted over there and they were not able to do their duty properly because their superiors were corrupted.

The police man says that it was “Conspiracy and my superiors were involved”. This source also aggress that the failure of the prohibition was inevitable because of all the corruption that happened. Most of the sources shown here agree that the failure of prohibition was inevitable because many high ranked people in the society were corrupted. The people who should be looking after people were corrupted. The rich people became richer and the poor people became poorer. This was one of the biggest mistakes made in the past and past cannot be changed.