PROMOTE MORAL DEVELOPMENT

Some reformers felt that the answer to societies problems was personal behavior

By the early 1800s… There was a lot of liquor around here

A barrel of hard cider sat by the door of thousands of farmhouses, available to everyone in the family.

.. Until well into the 19th century, most people, including doctors, considered alcohol nutritious and healthful...hard liquor was cheap and readily available, unlike milk, coffee and tea…Particularly in the 19th century, the consumption of liquor was a regular daily activity for most Americans, including children. Adults drank at home, at work and at play, usually every day and often all day

~ Campbell, Robert A.

Demon Rum or Easy Money

In many cities, the tolling of a bell at 11 a.m. and again at 4 p.m. marked “grog time,” when workers were granted an alcohol-soaked break.Most customers were men who passed through the swing-

doors to join their male comrades in the bar- room HOWEVER many saloons also had a side door known as

the 'ladies' entrance'.

Until 1900, saloons were open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Temperance Crusadedef: the movement against the sale of alcohol.

** supported Prohibitiondef: law to prohibit the making and the sale of alcohol.

Many in the movement wanted an outright ban on all alcoholic drinks, including beer, wine, and hard liquor. They saw alcohol as a source of social problems including violence, crime, and poverty

Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)

Anti-Saloon League

Anti-Saloon League Campaign, Dayton

At First - Pledged to stop drinking hard or distilled spirits, such as whiskey and gin only (toxic to body and soul)

*Some wine and beer had healthy benefits (not counted) nor was the wine in the Communion

Later, it became more popular to give up alcohol totally or to become a "teetotaler."

- was signed in a public meeting and witnessed by all the people present.

This was an important to the movement

WHY? Making a public declaration reinforced its importance and made it more difficult to reverse. Those who witnessed your actions were often available later to give you strength in keeping your word.

Display as a reminder…

SIGNED PLEDGES TO STOP DRINKING ALCOHOL.

From a book of The Ten Dialogues on the Effects of Ardent Spirits

Members of an imaginary temperate family consisting of Father, Mother, James, Thomas, and Philip.

Each dialogue contains a graphic story about the effects of alcohol

Kept in a chapbook (pocket size)

The Ten Dialogues on the Effects of Ardent Spirits (1831?)

~ Transcription ~

Dialogue IIIPp. 9-12 James: I have been with Father to the prison; don't you wish you had gone with us? Philip: I do not know; what did you see there? James: We saw a great many men shut up in the rooms, the doors of which were three or four inches thick, and large nails or spikes driven through them, with flatted heads, and so close together that they almost touch each other. The doors were locked with a padlock so large that I could hardly have carried it. The windows had bars of iron in them crossing each other, and so near together that a child could scarcely creep through; and the rooms were so dark and gloomy that we could but just see how dirty and frightful they looked. Philip: Why were the men shut up in those ugly rooms? James: I do not know, father did not tell me. Wont you tell us, Pa? Father: Some were put in the prison because they had stolen, some for having robbed others; one or two because they had committed murder; and some for other crimes. Philip: Father, what made those people do such bad things? Father: One half of them were led to their crimes by the habit of using strong drink. Drinking men are apt to become poor and lazy, and then they will steal and even rob, instead of laboring to earn their bread. They are easily made angry when drunk, and then they will curse, and swear, and even strike their fellow-creatures, and even kill them. James: When the men are shut up in the prison for their crimes, how long have they to stay? Father: That depends on the nature of their crime. Some remain three months, some six months, and some a year. Some are sent from this prison to another, called the States Prison, and are there shut up in a little dark cell where you could not see your hand, and are allowed nothing to eat or drink but bread and water. Some are forced to remain for ten years, some as long as they live; while others, instead of being sent to the States Prison, are hung by the neck till they are dead, and then the surgeons cut them to pieces. Philip: Do they ever hang people for drinking rum? Father: No, my son; but sometimes men are hung for the crimes they are led to commit by their having drank ardent spirits. I will relate to you a most dreadful instance of this kind. A man who had a wife and a number of small children, not having been taught by his parents, when he was young, that he never ought to drink rum, got into the habit of using it a little. It increased upon him by degrees, until he was often absent at the tavern home later than usual, he tried to open the door of his house, but found it fastened. Believing hat the was locked out by his wife, who had often remonstrated with him about his conduct, he, in a rage, suddenly formed the resolution, and set fire to the house, and burnt it to ashes, with his wife and children all in it. The man confessed his crime, and was hung.

III James and Philip discussing James' recent visit with their father to a prison. James relates the squalid conditions of the prison:• the doors locked with a padlock so large one could hardly have carried it• the windows with "bars of iron in them," • the rooms so dark and gloomy The boys asked their father why the men were shut up in those ugly rooms. The father's reply was that one half of them were led to their crimes by the habit of strong drink.

Focus on domestic: conditions within marriage,

including desertion, domestic violence, adoption,

neglect and abuse of children, and

divorce

Founded by Annie

Wittenmyer November 1874 in Cleveland, Ohio Organized by women who were

concerned about the destructive power of alcohol and the problems it was causing their families and society

Based itself upon Christian moral principles, such as sobriety and abstinence (self-discipline)

Some called for the addition of women’s suffrage (right to vote) to the group’s platform along with abstinence from alcohol.

In 1879 Wittenmyer, who opposed such a move, was replaced by Francis Willard

W vs. W

Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)

Carry NationBorn 1846 Father – Plantation Owner.Spent much time with the Bible

In 1867 married a young physician, Charles Gloyd - Heavy drinker - Had a child (sick) Carry attributed to her husband's drinking

Left him (drinking and inability to earn a steady living) - he died six months later. To survive, Carry turned to teaching and keeping rooms

In 1877, Carry married David Nation, a preacher, attorney and editor …moved to Kansas - saw to the needs of poor people, became a jail evangelist and helped to establish a local chapter of the WCTU.

Why does she have a hatchet?Kansas residents had voted for prohibition,BUT saloonkeepers ignored law

Carry began by praying …then rocks and bricks… turned to the hatchet

Her behavior provoked a tremendous uproar - sent her to jail repeatedly for disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace.

She also had eloquently speaking her mind and inspiring others

Anti-Saloon League Founded in 1893 in Oberlin,

Ohio 1895 - the League became a

powerful national organization Was a non-partisan organization

that focused on the single issue of prohibition

As time progressed…It was no longer enough to warn individuals of the danger of alcoholism. Drink was increasingly seen as a problem of the whole society, not just a personal danger.

WCTU poster

In 1913 Anti-Saloon League announced its campaign to achieve national prohibition through a constitutional amendment.

- Anti Saloon League allied with the Woman's Christian Temperance Union1916 - oversaw the election of

the two-thirds majorities necessary in both houses of Congress to initiate what became the 18th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States

Another cause – Women’s Suffrage Movement

Began in 1848 first women’s rights convention was held in Seneca Falls, New York.

For the next 50 years, woman suffrage supporters worked to educate the public about the validity of woman suffrage

Two ladies above were the best known leaders of women's suffrage (voting rights)

Later that year, Lucy Stone,

Julia Ward Howe, and others formed the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA).

By 1896, women had gained the right to vote in four states (Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho, and Utah).

Women and women's organizations also worked on behalf of many social and reform issues.

By the beginning of the new century, women's clubs in towns and cities across the nation were working to promote suffrage, better schools, the regulation of child labor, women in unions, and liquor prohibition.

Not all women believed in equality for the sexes.

Those who upheld traditional gender roles argued that politics were improper for women. Some even insisted that voting

might cause some women to "grow beards."

However, not until the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1919 did women throughout the nation gain the right to vote.

Fostering EfficiencyMany Progressive leaders put their faith in scientific principles to make society better

In Industry:Frederick Taylor began using time & motion studies to improve factory efficiency

Taylorism (Scientific Management) became an industry fad as factories sought to complete each task quickly

Fostering Efficiency Frederick Taylor began using time & motion studies to improve factory efficiency

Taylorism (Scientific Management) became an industry fad as factories sought to complete each task quickly

In Industry

Progressivism & EugenicsMany early progressives advocated eugenics (def: human engineering), to purge society's gene pool of undesirable traits. “the betterment of the human race.”

Progressives generally shared in common the view that government at every level must be actively involved in these reforms.

Eugenics was compatible with the progressive era's faith in science, the future, the regulatory potential of the state, and human perfectibility. Scientific knowledge - mediator of humankind's secular [material] problems

Eugenics would enable parents to focus their resources on fewer, better children

Fitter families & better babies

Going to the court…By 1927, the U.S. Supreme

Court had accepted the progressive belief that the state ought to be empowered to determine who should and should not be permitted to reproduce.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, the Court's progressive icon, wrote in 1915 that his "starting point for an ideal for the law" would be the "coordinated human effort ... to build a race."

“We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concerned in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world if, instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for the crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind.... Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” ~Oliver W. Holmes

BUCK v. BELL

Carrie Buck

*Judged to be “feeble-minded” andpromiscuous (slept around)

Reality…

All told, some 60,000 Americans were sterilized by the decrees of state governments

Last Topic…

Local, State, and Federal Government Reforms