Well, I blew off some steam this morning with a flash of exchanges with the usual suspects, starting long before dawn. I will not burden you with the spleen. Catharsis is good, though I have found it is not necessarily good for reading.

Anyway, there is a story on which I am working that is not ready for telling just yet, one that starts out like the annual thriller from Craig Johnson or C.J. Box that I wait for impatiently each year. That will have to keep for a while. I need to work on the manuscripts for the book about our pal Mac, and the one about Raven and Big Mama. Those are past due, and the holiday makes me think rationally about their collective passing.

Or worry about the weather. It is killer cold out west, and it may be coming our way.

First cup of coffee came along with the ten day forecast for Washington. Unseasonably warm and wet, they say. I don’t know where the Canadian chill is going. With luck we can avoid a pre-Holiday Snowmaggedon. But you can never tell in this strange confluence of the Chesapeake and the Piedmont.

Anyway, with all the talk about how good things are going with some major legislation these days, I thought it might be appropriate to remember another Grand Experiment in the American Experience.

This is the anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition, and all of us who enjoy a nice glass of something at happy hour time should raise a glass to a quainter time.

Remember? Some social crusaders had a fabulous idea. The people did not know what was good for them, and people Who Knew Better had to take action to save the people from themselves.

In 1919, the Great War was over, and millions had not survived the deadly Influenza Pandemic. The was something apocalyptic in the air. The prototype of the Nanny State succeeded in getting the requisite number of State Legislatures to ratify the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution.

It was widely believed that Prohibition would protect families, women, and children from the effects of alcohol abuse, eliminate the influence of the Saloon culture on the political process and all sorts of great stuff.

The Women’s Christian Temperance Union was one of the driving forces behind the 18th Amendment (and the Volstead Act that implemented it) made it the law of the land.

It is interesting to note that the forces promoting Prohibition made all the correct steps in the Constitutional Process. The drafted an amendment, and went to the States to gain a majority. It did not require making things up as implementation went along, or Executive tinkering or legislation by edict.

Proponents of the Amendment believed that banning alcoholic beverages would reduce or eliminate a host of social problems, some of them pre-exiting conditions like public drunkenness, crime, mental illness, and poverty.

In 1925, my favorite curmudgeon, H. L. Menken, summed it up. My pal Old Jim reminds me a great deal of the Sage of Baltimore. He stated with confidence that consequences were going to be the direct opposite of what was claimed, and as it turned out, he was right.

There is not less drunkenness in the Republic, but more. There was not less crime, but more. There is not less insanity, but more. The cost of government was not smaller, but vastly greater in order to enforce an edict that no one respected.

Prohibitionists argued that the Great Experiment could work, if only more resources were poured into it. “We are so close,” they said. “Just a few more police, and a little more money.”

Stop me if any of this seems familiar.

Anyway, the realization was growing that the widespread disregard for the Law of the Land was having a negative impact on all of the laws. It made one out of five Detroiters participants in a whole-sale illegal industry. Taxes were lost. Gangsterism was enshrined as an alternate government.

Republicans were the Drys, and Democrats were the Wets in the struggle over the notion of whether the Government could control the people. The campaign for repeal gained ground after The Crash in ’29. America needed a stiff one.

An organization called the United Repeal Council lobbied at both the Republican and Democratic national conventions in 1932 to integrate repeal into their respective presidential election campaigns. Ultimately, the Republicans continued to defend Prohibition, true believers in the Grand Experiment.

The Wets joined with the Democratic campaign and supported Franklin Roosevelt, and another Constitutional Amendment.

Doing it the right way resulted in the 21st Amendment. The states fell in line, one by one, and on this day in 1933, FDR was the first president since Woodrow Wilson to have a legal beer. The Great Experiment was over, at least for a minute.

Of course, the people who know what is good for you are still around, and shriller than ever. It takes constant vigilance, you know?

Writing that was thirsty work. On this special day, consider joining me, Old Jim, Tex the Bartender, Jasper the Best Pool Player on Guam, Pert Brenna, Chanteuse Mary, John-with and without, placid Jamie and the Lovely Bea in celebrating Repeal Day. No costumes to buy, no rivers to dye green.

Pick up a six-pack on the way home from work. Take a nip off the office bottle. Have a glass of Happy Hour White at Willow. Because we can.

It’s the law of the land.

Copyright 2013 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303