Prohibition And The Rise Of Al Capone

2 Pages 383 Words

The 1920’s and 30’s proved to be a tumultuous time in American history, due in part to the ‘National Prohibition Act’. The Act attempted to cease alcohol sales and consumption nation wide. The National Prohibition Act, or Volstead Act, was dubbed a ‘noble experiment’. The Act that was initiated with such honorable intent was widely regarded as a failure and gave rise to a world of organized crime that changed the face of America. The immense failure of the Prohibition Act coupled with the rise of organized crime in America at the time, has resulted in the 1920’s and 30’s being remembered as dark spot in American history.

The National Prohibition Act was initiated in 1920 and remained in effect until 1933. The Act was supposed to reduce crime and corruption levels, solve social problems, reduce tax burdens created by prisons and poorhouses, and improve health and hygiene in America. The excitement of the proposed Act is exemplified the speech given by Reverend Billy Sunday that predicted ‘the reign of tears is over. The slums will soon be a memory. We will turn our prisons into factories and our jails into storehouse and corncribs. Men will walk upright now, women will smile and children will laugh. Hell will be forever for rent’. This was a view shared by the vast majority of people who were in favor of the Act. This view however, soon came to a grinding halt. The Act fostered the rise of illegal operations nation wide, with bootleggers and speak-easies soon providing alcohol to the general public at an unsurpassed rate. This period saw the crime rates rise to two times that of the pre-prohibition era. The sale of medicinal alcohol increased some 400 percent between 1923 and 1931.

The dramatic increase in organized crime in this period also compounded the problems encountered by Prohibition Act. Organized crime outfits were running rampant across American and the members of these organizations soon shifted the...