Woman's Christian Temperance Union Cartoon

The Anti-Saloon League (now known as the ''American Council on Addiction and Alcohol Problems'') is an organization of the

temperance movement The temperance movement is a social movement promoting temperance or complete abstinence from consumption of alcoholic beverages. Participants in the movement typically criticize alcohol intoxication or promote teetotalism, and its leaders emph ...

that

lobbied In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, which ...

for prohibition in the United States in the early 20th century. Founded in 1893 in Oberlin, Ohio, it was a key component of the

Progressive Era The Progressive Era (late 1890s – late 1910s) was a period of widespread social activism and political reform across the United States focused on defeating corruption, monopoly, waste and inefficiency. The main themes ended during Am ...

, and was strongest in the South and rural North, drawing support from

Protestant Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...

ministers and their congregations, especially Methodists, Baptists, Disciples and Congregationalists. It concentrated on legislation, and cared about how legislators had voted, not whether they drank or not. Founded as a state society in

Oberlin, Ohio Oberlin is a city in Lorain County, Ohio, United States, 31 miles southwest of Cleveland. Oberlin is the home of Oberlin College, a liberal arts college and music conservatory with approximately 3,000 students. The town is the birthplace of th ...

, in 1893, its influence spread rapidly. In 1895, it became a national organization and quickly rose to become the most powerful prohibition lobby in America, overshadowing the older

Woman's Christian Temperance Union The Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) is an international temperance organization, originating among women in the United States Prohibition movement. It was among the first organizations of women devoted to social reform with a program th ...

and the Prohibition Party. Its triumph was nationwide prohibition locked into the Constitution with passage of the 18th Amendment in 1919. It was decisively defeated when Prohibition was repealed in 1933. However, the organization continued – albeit with multiple name changes – and as of 2016 is known as the American Council on Addiction and Alcohol Problems.

Organizational structure and operation

The League was the first modern pressure group in the United States organized around one issue. Unlike earlier popular movements, it utilized bureaucratic methods learned from business to build a strong organization. The League's founder and first leader, Howard Hyde Russell (1855–1946), believed that the best leadership was selected, not elected. Russell built from the bottom up, shaping local leagues and raising the most promising young men to leadership at the local and state levels. This organizational strategy reinvigorated the

. Publicity for the League was handled by

Edward Young Clarke Edward Young Clarke was the Imperial Wizard '' pro tempore'' of the Ku Klux Klan from 1915 to 1922. Prior to his Klan activities, Clarke headed the Atlanta-based Southern Publicity Association. He later served as the president of Monarch Publis ...

and

Mary Elizabeth Tyler Mary Elizabeth Tyler (July 10, 1881 – September 10, 1924) was an Atlanta public-relations professional who, along with Edward Young Clarke, founded the Southern Publicity Association. Their organization helped to turn the initially anemic seco ...

of the Southern Publicity Association. In 1909, the League moved its national headquarters from Washington to

Westerville, Ohio Westerville is a city in Franklin County, Ohio, Franklin and Delaware County, Ohio, Delaware counties in the U.S. state of Ohio. A northeastern suburb of Columbus, Ohio, Columbus, the population was 39,190 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 ...

, which had a reputation for supporting temperance. The American Issue Publishing House, the publishing arm of the League, was also in Westerville.

Ernest Cherrington Ernest Cherrington (1877–1950) was a leading temperance journalist (see temperance movement). He became active in the Anti-Saloon League and was appointed editor of the organization's publishing house, the American Issue Publishing Company. He ed ...

headed the company. It printed so many leaflets – over 40 tons of mail per month – that Westerville was the smallest town to have a first class post office. From 1948 until 1950 the group was named the Temperance League, from 1950 to 1964 the National Temperance League, and from 1964 to 2015 the

American Council on Alcohol Problems The Anti-Saloon League (now known as the ''American Council on Addiction and Alcohol Problems'') is an organization of the temperance movement that lobbied for prohibition in the United States in the early 20th century. Founded in 1893 in Oberl ...

(ACAP); in 2016 the group rebranded as the

American Council on Addiction and Alcohol Problems The Anti-Saloon League (now known as the ''American Council on Addiction and Alcohol Problems'') is an organization of the temperance movement that lobbied for prohibition in the United States in the early 20th century. Founded in 1893 in Oberl ...

(ACAAP). the organization continues its " neo-prohibitionist agenda", with the addition of "other drugs" such as opioids. ACAAP is headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama. A museum about the Anti-Saloon League is at the

Westerville Public Library The Westerville Public Library is a public library that serves the community of Westerville, Ohio, a suburb of Columbus, Ohio. As a school district library, its geographic boundaries are defined by the Westerville City School District which is lo ...

Pressure politics

The League's most prominent leader was Wayne Wheeler, although both Ernest Cherrington and William E. "Pussyfoot" Johnson were also highly influential and powerful. The League used

pressure politics Pressure politics generally refers to political action which relies heavily on the use of mass media and mass communications to persuade politicians that the public wants or demands a particular action. However, it can also refer to intimidation, t ...

in legislative politics, which it is credited with developing. Howard Ball has written that the Ku Klux Klan and the Anti-Saloon league were both immensely powerful pressure groups in

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

during the Post-

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

period. A local newspaper editor at the time wrote that "In Alabama, it is hard to tell where the Anti-Saloon League ends and the Klan begins". During the May 1928 primary in Alabama, the League joined with Klansmen and members of the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). When an Alabama state senator proposed an anti-masking statute "to emasculate the order's ability to terrorize people", lobbying led by J. Bib Mills, the superintendent of the Alabama Anti-Saloon League, ensured that the bill failed. When it came to fighting “wet” candidates, especially candidates such as Al Smith in the presidential election of 1928, the League was less effective because its audience was already Republican.

National constitutional amendment

The League used a multitiered approach in its attempts to secure a dry (prohibition) nation through national legislation and congressional hearings, the Scientific Temperance Federation, and its American Issue Publishing Company. The League also used emotion based on patriotism, efficiency and anti-

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

sentiment in World War I. The activists saw themselves as preachers fulfilling their religious duty of eliminating liquor in America. As it tried to mobilize public opinion in favor of a dry, saloonless nation, the League invented many of the modern techniques of public relations.

Local work

The League lobbied at all levels of government for legislation to prohibit the manufacture or import of spirits, beer and wine. Ministers had launched several efforts to close Arizona saloons after the 1906 creation of League chapters in Yuma,

Tucson , "(at the) base of the black ill , nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town" , image_map = , mapsize = 260px , map_caption = Interactive map ...

, and Phoenix. A League organizer from New York arrived in 1909, but the Phoenix chapter was stymied by local-option elections, whereby local areas could decide whether to allow saloons. League members pressured local police to take licenses from establishments that violated closing hours or served women and minors, and they provided witnesses to testify about these violations. One witness was Frank Shindelbower, a juvenile from a poor family, who testified that several saloons had sold him liquor; as a result those saloons lost their licenses. However, owners discovered that Shindelbower had perjured himself, and he was imprisoned. After the ''Arizona Gazette'' and other newspapers pictured Shindelbower as the innocent tool of the Anti-Saloon League, he was pardoned.

State operations

At the state level, the League had mixed results, usually doing best in rural and southern states. It made little headway in larger cities, or among liturgical church members such as Catholics, Jews, Episcopalians and German Lutherans. Pegram (1990) explains its success in Illinois under William Hamilton Anderson. From 1900 and 1905 the League worked to obtain a local option referendum law and became an official church federation. Local Option was passed in 1907 and by 1910 40 of Illinois's 102 counties and 1,059 of the state's townships and precincts had become dry, including some Protestant areas around Chicago. Despite these successes, after the Prohibition amendment was ratified in 1919, social problems ignored by the League – such as organized crime – undermined the public influence of the single-issue pressure group, and it faded in importance. Pegram (1997) uses the League's failure in Maryland to explore the relationship between Southern Progressivism and national progressivism. The League's Maryland leader 1907–14 was William H. Anderson, but he was unable to adapt to local conditions, such as the large German element. The League failed to ally with local political bosses and attacked the Democratic Party. In Maryland, as in the rest of the South, Pegram concludes, traditional religious, political, and racial concerns constrained reform movements even as they converted Southerners to the new national politics of federal intervention and interest-group competition.

Failure

Unable to cope with the failures of prohibition after 1928, especially bootlegging and

organized crime Organized crime (or organised crime) is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally th ...

as well as reduced government revenue, the League failed to counter the repeal forces. Also their failure to disassociate from the Ku Klux Klan brought on negative connotations with the League. Led by prominent Democrats, Franklin D. Roosevelt won the U.S. presidency election in 1932 on a wet platform. A new Constitutional amendment passed easily in 1933 to repeal the 18th Amendment, and the League lost its power.

References

External links

Ohio History Central (Westerville)American Council on Alcohol Problems RecordsAnti-Saloon League & Prohibition HistoryAnti-Saloon League OriginsAnti-Saloon League Leaders
* at

Nebraska State Historical Society History Nebraska, formerly the Nebraska State Historical Society is a Nebraska state agency, founded in 1878 to "encourage historical research and inquiry, spread historical information ... and to embrace alike aboriginal and modern history." I ...

Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture – Anti-Saloon League
{{Prohibition Temperance organizations in the United States Prohibition in the United States Westerville, Ohio Organizations established in 1893 1893 establishments in the United States Organizations based in Ohio Western Reserve, Ohio