Eighteenth Amendment - Prohibition of Alcohol (Repealed)
Original Text
Section 1. After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.
Section 2. The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.
In Plain Language
The Eighteenth Amendment prohibited manufacturing, selling, and transporting intoxicating liquors—but not personal consumption. It was the first constitutional amendment to impose a criminal prohibition directly through constitutional text rather than ordinary legislation, and the first to expand federal police power into a domain previously left to states.
Congress followed with the Volstead Act of 1919 to define "intoxicating liquors" and build federal enforcement machinery. The amendment gave both Congress and states concurrent enforcement power—an unprecedented structural feature. Both federal and state governments could prosecute violations simultaneously.
It was repealed by the Twenty-First Amendment in 1933—the only amendment in U.S. history to be fully repealed by another.
Historical Significance
Manufacturing, selling, and transporting alcohol became illegal on January 17, 1920. This is the only amendment ever fully repealed. Organized crime controlled bootlegging, and enforcement proved impossible — the Twenty-First Amendment repealed it on December 5, 1933.
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Key Concepts0/6
Historical Context
The temperance movement had campaigned for decades before World War I gave prohibitionists decisive political leverage. German-American families owned a substantial share of U.S. breweries, and temperance activists accused them of aiding Germany. The Anti-Saloon League and Women's Christian Temperance Union lobbied intensively, arguing that wartime grain conservation justified prohibition nationally.
Congress passed the Eighteenth Amendment in December 1917 by the required two-thirds margins, and states ratified it on January 16, 1919. Prohibition took effect exactly one year later on January 17, 1920, giving the liquor industry time to wind down operations. The concurrent enforcement structure—both federal and state governments could prosecute violations—was unprecedented in constitutional design and proved unworkable in practice.
The constitutional experiment failed in ways the framers didn't anticipate. Enforcement required a massive federal bureaucracy that proved unequal to the task. National Prohibition Cases (1920) upheld the amendment's constitutionality, but couldn't resolve the enforcement problem. By 1931, the Wickersham Commission commissioned by President Hoover documented systematic corruption and enforcement failure—and still recommended continuing Prohibition. The Great Depression, by cutting off alcohol tax revenue the federal government could no longer afford to forego, finally broke the political deadlock.
How This Shows Up Today
Prohibition stands as the only constitutional amendment ever repealed—evidence that even supermajority-supported constitutional changes can be undone when they fail. Organized crime syndicates built around bootlegging during Prohibition proved more durable than the amendment itself; Congress passed the RICO Act in 1970 specifically to dismantle mafia organizations whose roots traced to that era. Today, marijuana legalization advocates cite Prohibition's failure as evidence that drug bans create black markets without reducing use. Twenty-four states have legalized recreational marijuana while federal prohibition continues, creating the same enforcement contradictions that plagued alcohol policy in the 1920s.
Repealed in 1933
Historical lessons for drug policy debates
Example of failed constitutional social engineering
Discussion Questions4
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