Early leaders
Prominent people in the history of the temperance movement have included such names as Abraham Lincoln, General S F Cary, and Hon Neal Dow. Sir Leonard Tilley, a Canadian statesman, was elected Most Worthy Patriarch of the Order of the Sons of Temperance in 1854.
Rev Lyman Beecher (father of Henry Ward Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe), as minister of the Congregational Church of East Hampton, New York, spoke out in the interests of temperance and, from 1810, stirred Congregationalists to aggressive action; out of which developed various local and national temperance societies, including the Massachusetts Society for the Suppression of Intemperance. He was a co-founder of the American Temperance Society (formerly the American Society for the Promotion of Temperance).
In Ireland the name of Father Theobald Mathew (known as the Apostle of Temperance) stands out for his pledge-signing campaign. The first Division of the Sons of Temperance in Ireland, Apostle No.1, was instituted in Cork on 13 October 1853 under the personal direction of Father Mathew.
In England in March 1832 Joseph Livesey founded the Preston Temperance Society whose pledge required members not to drink spirits. But Livesey pressed the issue of total abstinence and, in August 1832, he and six others first signed this pledge: "We agree to abstain from all liquors of an intoxicating quality, whether Ale, Porter, Wine, or Ardent Spirits, except as Medicines." Livesey and his colleagues became known as the 'Seven Men of Preston'. In September 1834 was formed The British Teetotal Temperance Society.
In 1847 Rev Jabez Tunnicliffe, a Baptist pastor, invited Mrs Ann Jane Carlile to speak at meetings of the Leeds Temperance Society. Looking down from the platform at one of the mass gatherings of children, Mrs Carlile commented: "I think we ought to call the present meeting a Band of Hope." Thus was born the Band of Hope, the first organized movement for boys and girls.
The Independent Order of Good Templars was founded in 1851 in Utica, New York, and welcomed members of either gender and of any race. Its founder was Daniel Cady who had been a member of the Sons of Temperance.
Role of women in the temperance movement
The first temperance petition on the continent of North America was presented on 22 May 1802 by the women of the Six Nations of the Iroquois to Joseph Brant, Mohawk chieftain, at Burlington, Ontario, urging that he use his power and influence to have liquor removed from their neighbourhood.
Frances Willard travelled the American East Coast participating in the women's temperance movement. Her tireless efforts for women's suffrage and for prohibition included a 50-day speaking tour in 1874, an average of 30,000 miles of travel a year, and an average of 400 lectures a year for a 10-year period. In 1874 she participated in the creation of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) of which she was the first corresponding secretary. She was elected president of the United States WCTU in 1879, a position which she held for the remainder of her life. She created the worldwide WCTU in 1883, and became its president in 1888.
Carrie (or Carry) Nation was particularly noted for promoting her anti-alcohol viewpoint through vandalism. On many occasions, Nation would enter an alcohol-serving establishment and attack the bar with a tomahawk. She adopted the name Carry A Nation, and had it registered as a trademark in the state of Kansas. She published a bi-weekly newsletter called The Smasher's Mail, a newspaper entitled The Hatchet, and later in life exploited her name by appearing in vaudeville, selling photographs of herself, charging to lecture, and marketing miniature hatchets. After her death in 1911 at Eureka Springs, Arkansas she was buried in an unmarked grave in Belton, Missouri. The WCTU later erected a stone inscribed "Faithful to the Cause of Prohibition, She Hath Done What She Could" to mark her accomplishments. Her home in Medicine Lodge, Kansas was bought by the WCTU in the 1950s and was declared a US National Historic Landmark in 1976.
Susan B Anthony was a prominent civil rights leader involved in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. In the era before the American Civil War, Susan Brownell Anthony took a prominent role in the New York anti-slavery and anti-alcohol movements. In 1849, aged 29, she became secretary of the Daughters of Temperance, which gave her a forum to speak out against alcohol abuse.
In Britain the National British Women's Total Abstinence Union was affiliated to the Woman's Christian Temperance Union.
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, refers to a law which prohibits alcohol. In the history of the United States, prohibition – also known as 'The Noble Experiment' – is the period during the 1920s and 1930s when the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol for consumption were banned nationally as mandated in the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Following campaigning by the temperance movement, and the Anti-Saloon League, the US Senate proposed the 18th Amendment on 18 December 1917. Having been approved by 36 states, the amendment was ratified on 16 January 1919 and effected on 16 January 1920. Some states had already enacted prohibition prior to the ratification of the 18th Amendment.
The 'Volstead Act' passed through Congress over President Woodrow Wilson's veto on 28 October 1919 and established the legal definition of intoxicating liquor. Though this act prohibited the sale of alcohol, it did little to enforce the law. The illegal production and distribution of liquor, or bootlegging, became rampant. It is estimated that by 1925 there were between 30,000 and 100,000 'speakeasy' clubs in New York City.
Prohibition became increasingly unpopular during the Depression, especially in large cities. On 23 March 1933 President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law an amendment to the 'Volstead Act' known as the 'Cullen-Harrison Act', allowing the manufacture and sale of certain kinds of alcoholic beverages. On 5 December 1933 the ratification of the 21st Amendment repealed the 18th Amendment.