Prohibition Essays (886 words) - Prohibition In The United States

Prohibition Prohibition In Canada Prohibition was a very interesting time in the history of Canada it was a very good time period for the country and also a bad time for the country. Prohibition all began to rise around the 1840's and the 1850's by temperance groups in Canada, this set the bases for prohibition because some people were starting to see the affect that alcohol had on a society. Prohibition actually only lasted for two years ( 1917 to 1920 ) through out the entire country, except Quebec they adopted the law in 1919 but they could still sell light beer, cider and wine. At this time the laws that were in place were that alcohol was prohibited in every place in Canada except Quebec. Prohibition was not all about the use of alcohol it was an effort to purify the society and the banning of alcohol was thought to be good for the society as a whole but, did not benefit the society any at all cause they spent just as much money trying to enforce the laws of prohibition then the people were spending on alcohol. Prohibition was a very good time some citizens though because it was a good way to make money and fast, this was by bootlegging and smuggling but, it was also a risky way to make money as it was illegal to do so. Bootlegging was a very common thing to do so back then because of the rewards in doing it. There was so much bootlegging going on during prohibition that the United States depended very much on eastern Canada when United States went dry too. A group of bootleggers from the U.S. actually came up to Luienburge and bought a boat called the Schooner and used it to ship booze out of Nova Scotia to American ships, the Schooner did this from1924 to 1928 when Nova Scotia was still dry. Smuggling was a very big business in Canada, in the first seven months alone during 1920 of prohibition there was 900, 000 cases of liquor transported to America, this made it a very good business to get into, it was harder to buys strong liquor then to buy less strong liquor. When caught bootlegging liquor you would be issued a fine, this made things alright because everyone was happy, the laws were so hard to enforce that the government was just happy collecting fine money and the bootleggers were happy cause it was a small price to pay for the amount of money they were making. The most ironic thing about prohibition is that it is the major bases for what we call organized crime. When prohibition was first being, talked about in the 1840's and the 1850's this was the beginning of the subject prohibition In 1864 the Dunken Act was passed and this left the local people to declare if their counties should be dry. This act fell apart when confederation came about in Canada but, it came back about 14 years later but it was called The Canadian Temperance Act (The Scott Act) this act was an act of trying to control liquor. In 1886 Nova Scotia had its own Temperance Act, they wanted to tighten up liquor regulations. Schools at the time had mandatory Temperance education that was made to be taught. This was the start of prohibition in Canada. It took quite a few years to get off the ground and get peoples attention. Prohibition actually did not get popular until after World War One because the focus of the people of Canada was the issue of warfare. Some of the arguments by prohibitionists were that drinking led to crimes and abnormal and obscene behavior but when alco hol was banned the actual crime rate increased substantially. Alcohol was also linked to other occurrences such as insanity, wife and child abuse, destruction, poverty and economic inefficiency and medical issues like heart failure, flabby muscles, trouble breathing etc. It is known today that alcohol is not a direct cause of any of these medical situations. Alcohol was also said to be poisonous by prohibitionists. It was believed by prohibitionists that prohibition would be better for the economy as a whole and