So in conclusion, the main factors that contributed to prohibition repeal in December 1933 were the lack of public support for prohibition, the role of organised crime, the problems of enforcing the law as well as the fact that some supporters of prohibition changed their attitudes to disagree with it and economic and political factors (read more…)

I think that the most important factor that led to the repeal prohibition in 1933 was the lack of public support for the law.

If the vast majority of people had supported prohibition and had not drunk, then there would have been no market for organised crime to make huge amounts money from (read more…)

So I have covered the main factors that led to the repeal of prohibition in December 1933.

However many of them are linked (read more…)

Political factors were crucial to the timing of prohibition repeal. This is because there was a presidential election in 1932 and Roosevelt and the Democrats stood for the repeal of prohibition.

Roosevelt promised a New Deal to put America back to work and restore to economy (read more…)

Economic factors were very important to the timing of prohibition repeal.

The Wall Street Crash of 1929 sent America into a economic depression and caused mass unemployment. One of the arguments for prohibition was that it would make America a more efficient work force. This was obviously no longer valid as the economy was in ruins (read more…)

Some of the same people that supported prohibition in the first place now began to change their minds.

After the St. Valentines Day Massacre, a former supporter of prohibition, Pauline Sabine, said she was “convinced that its failure (read more…)

The increase in crime and corruption led to people turning against prohibition and toward prohibition repeal as it had caused a huge increase in crime.

Corruption in the authorities was one of the key problems of enforcing the law. The gangsters bribed the authorities and so it was very difficult to convict any of them. It was estimated that 1 in 12 prohibition agents were taking bribes and some were being driven to work in chauffeur driven cars.

The Mayor of Chicago (read more…)

Prohibition was ignored by many people so the law was in effect almost useless as there was still a strong demand for alcohol, and people were still drinking.

This large demand meant there was a lot of money to be made in the illegal liquor trade. Gangsters moved into bootlegging and began to get extremely rich. Gangsters were making around $2 billion a year from bootlegging (read more…)

From the very start of prohibition in 1920, the law against the drinking of alcohol was ignored by many people. The lack of public support for prohibition was one of the most important long term factors that led to its repeal in December 1933.

In 1933, 282122 illegal stills were seized. In 1925 there were 10000 speakeasies in Chicago and 15000 in Detroit. In 1926 there were 30000 in New York, these figures show a clear lack of support by the public and by 1933 there were almost 220000 speakeasies in the USA (read more…)

This is a great question which many people have tried to answer. Why was prohibtion repealed so soon after it had been introduced…

Over the next few posts I will cover the reasons why it was repealed and I will try to answer the above question.

Prohibition was repealed in December 1933 because of a variety of long and short term factors (read more…)

Here are some of the reasons why the American government was force to repeal the Prohibition Act of 1920.

St Valentines Day Massacre of 1929. Seven of the Bugs Moran Gang were shot by Al Capone’s gang (read more…)

There were two main reason why prohibition failed.

Firstly there was not enough officials to enforce the law. America’s border is 32000 km long and its population was over 100 million (read more…)

Prohibition never worked.

In 1925 Americans drank 200 million gallons of spirits, 685 million gallons of malt liquor and 118 million gallons of wine (read more…)

Prohibition failed because gangs of criminals moved into the bootlegging business. They made so much money that they were able to pay off officials to kept themselves out of trouble.

The biggest gangster was Al Capone (read more…)

Prohibition was the banning of alcohol that began in the USA in 1920.

Speakeasies were the secret bars and saloons that illegally sold alcohol usually in back rooms or cellars (read more…)