War on Alcohol Ended 73 Years Ago Today

Ronald Bailey | December 5, 2006

Dewar's scotch is running a double page ad celebrating the 73rd anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition in the New York Times today. The ad reprints the front page of the December 5, 1933 New York Times "To Remind You Just How Bad It Could Have Been." The New York Times headline reads, "Legal Liquor Due Tonight: City Ready to Celebrate: Stores to Open Tomorrow."  An interesting subhead notes the economic effect of eliminating black markets: "Repeal Cuts Price of Drinks in Half."

Unfortunately, there is no end in sight yet for the similarly insane War on Drugs.

Disclosure: I don't own Dewar's stock and I will lift a glass of Lagavulin this evening to toast the anniversary.

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Comments

|12.5.06 @ 12:41PM|#

Your suggestion is a great one! If, every Dec 5th, we all went down to our local watering holes and celebrated End of Prohibition Day, it might truly hasten the end of our current Drug Prohibition/War on American Civil Rights and Liberties.

Do you think that, out of the multitude of companies involved in the sale of alcoholic beverages, there could be found a critical mass to inaugurate this tradition? Or, are they all afraid of exercising thier First Amendment rights to free speech and association? If not, we can always make it a grassroots individual effort.

I know what I'll be doing this evening after work!
Here's to a true end for Prohibition....Cheers!

Steve Verdon|12.5.06 @ 12:49PM|#

Lagavulin? Ahhh, nice to find another fan of that fine beverage. Oh, and good idea on having some tonight to celebrate...not that I need much encouragement to drink Lagavulin.

|12.5.06 @ 12:55PM|#

As far as I can tell we're still fighting it.

|12.5.06 @ 1:03PM|#

Disclosure: I don't own Dewar's stock and I will lift a glass of Lagavulin this evening to toast the anniversary.

Ok, but you still haven't told us if you're getting kick-backs from any drug cartels. ;-)

R C Dean|12.5.06 @ 1:09PM|#

Lagavulin? Ahhh, nice to find another fan of that fine beverage.

Make that three of us.

I will be hoisting a glass tonight, but I think I will be finishing off a bottle of 16 year old Laphroig. Nectar!

Anyone care to speculate what the NYT angle on repeal of the WOD would be? I'm predicting "Cut and Run in the War on Drugs: Women, Children Hardest Hit."

|12.5.06 @ 1:11PM|#

Does this mean I have to have 73 drinks tonight, plus one to grow on?

|12.5.06 @ 1:13PM|#

Dewar's and soda is my go-to drink.

Guess I'll make this evening's a double.

|12.5.06 @ 1:25PM|#

Would drugs now illegal, such as cocaine, marijuana, LSD-25, MDMA, etc really be cheaper if it were made legal? Because as far as I know, a lot of those drugs are pretty damn cheap right now.

I was actually having a conversation about this not too long ago, and I was thinking that some drugs might even become more expensive, as companies producing, distributing, and selling them would almost certainly have liability issues to underwrite, at the very least. I guess I would need to know more about how alcohol companies and bars, for example, keep away from such issues.

I suppose I've got a lot of reading to do today. :)

|12.5.06 @ 1:42PM|#

I wonder how long it's going to take before the NYT gets hate mail from Joe Califano and the other anti-alcohol groups for printing that ad?

|12.5.06 @ 1:44PM|#

The end of prohibition: a reminder that there's one thing a libertarian can thank FDR for.

Warren|12.5.06 @ 1:50PM|#

Dewar's and soda is my go-to drink.

Mine is; "Dewar's, Soda, Twist" and I hate it when they ask "lemon or lime?" it ruins the whole meter. They usually throw in the rocks but if they ask, I say "surprise me"

|12.5.06 @ 1:55PM|#

I will lift a glass of Lagavulin this evening to toast the anniversary.

On single-malts, I'm a Glenlivet, 'fiddich & the like m'self.... But I'm out of scotch altogether and just drank the last of my bourbon so it'll be Stoli martini's tonight.

Sláinte!

Deus ex Machina|12.5.06 @ 2:06PM|#

War on Alcohol Ended 73 Years Ago Today

And the war on fat is just beginning. New York City's Board of Health has voted to ban artery-clogging trans-fats from the city's restaurants.

|12.5.06 @ 2:28PM|#

.. Warren ..

.. the way it was explained to me, a "twist" is lemon and a "squeeze" is lime ..

.. Hobbit

|12.5.06 @ 2:38PM|#

One of the more interesting thing that would happen if drugs were legalized is the effects on the drugs themselves of turning the power of big pharm research loose on them. Right now, no one does any research into improving the quality and reducing the downside of recreational drugs. Recreational drugs are crude chemical conoctions made by amateurs in garages. Who is to say if given the time and effort, someone couldn't develop a non-addictive form of cocaine? Or, some kind of euphoric endusing drug that has no known side effects? What is even more interesting, or depressing, is the lengths to which people would go to to explain why such a drug, if developed, really were a bad thing that needed to be kept out of people's hands.

|12.5.06 @ 2:45PM|#

John - that's not true. There are very sophisticated labs cranking out some of these banned substances as it is. MDMA was being somewhat successfully used in psychological treatments before it was outlawed. Only now are experiments with LSD-25, psilocybin, and MDMA being allowed to continue. Imagine what we've lost in these last 30+ years.

Check out MAPS.ORG - they're fighting the good fight.

|12.5.06 @ 2:46PM|#

"John - that's not true. There are very sophisticated labs cranking out some of these banned substances as it is."

I am sure there are, but I would still bet that big pharm would do things that the underground drug labs have never dreamed of doing. Yes, we have lost a lot of legitimate research thanks to the drug wars.

|12.5.06 @ 2:52PM|#

Where's the two page ad proclaiming: "End of Alcohol prohibition: Dec 5, 1933; End of drug prohibition: ???"

|12.5.06 @ 2:54PM|#

MEMO:

Henceforth the term "Prohibition" is to be shitcanned by all libertarians and other sane peoples. In its place the phrase "The War on Alcohol" is to be substituted.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Robert|12.5.06 @ 3:24PM|#

"One of the more interesting thing that would happen if drugs were legalized is the effects on the drugs themselves of turning the power of big pharm research loose on them. Right now, no one does any research into improving the quality and reducing the downside of recreational drugs. Recreational drugs are crude chemical conoctions made by amateurs in garages. Who is to say if given the time and effort, someone couldn't develop a non-addictive form of cocaine? Or, some kind of euphoric endusing drug that has no known side effects?"

There's nothing specific stopping them from doing that now but the gen'l legal climate. And that climate would not change even if laws criminalizing specific substances were repealed, because it would still be generally acknowledged that gov't had the power to prohibit, or not prohibit, the sale of whatever products they wanted to. There would probably be a good chance any new recreational substance would be prohibited just when it was about to hit the market, even if the old ones had just been decriminalized.

It's like with the cigaret companies and substitute products. They've been naturals to market subs for ciggies, and there's no specific law against it, but the current legal climate is extremely unfavorable to such development.

The last time the social-legal climate looked good for this sort of thing was in the 1970s. Safer cigarets, "non-addictive" subs for narcotics, those ideas were taken seriously.

So basically, we'd have to have repeal, and then a long time to pass after repeal, for ideas like this to fly again. Either that or state & federal constitutional amendments.

I. Self. Divine.|12.5.06 @ 3:28PM|#

I was actually having a conversation about this not too long ago, and I was thinking that some drugs might even become more expensive, as companies producing, distributing, and selling them would almost certainly have liability issues to underwrite, at the very least.
--------------
I don't think it would. I'm pretty sure that the market competition from individuals capable of producing these substances would keep it down, lest the damn corner thugs sell more crack than Pfizer.

Dan T.|12.5.06 @ 3:54PM|#

Ask the mother whose child was killed by a drunk driver if the repeal of Prohibition has been all roses.

grylliade|12.5.06 @ 4:33PM|#

On single-malts, I'm a Glenlivet, 'fiddich & the like m'self

Yeah, Glenlivet is the best of the scotches I've tried. Too rich for my poor student's budget, though, most of the time. So I drink Speyburn instead. Tastes very similar to Glenlivet, but is about half the price. I mean, a decent scotch for twenty dollars a fifth? Whod'a thunk it?

Ask the mother whose child was killed by a drunk driver if the repeal of Prohibition has been all roses.

C'mon, Dan, now you're not even trying.

|12.5.06 @ 4:40PM|#

Prohibition may have been repealed, but the war on alcohol continues. Rarely do I read about DWI arrests, now it is DUI, the difference being that the driver is not intoxicated, but has has one drink. Additionally, alcohol is prohibited in near every park and campground, drinking in public is prohibited in most places. Parents can be prosecuted for supplying wine with dinner to 19 year olds. No, the war on alcohol is alive and well.

Rhywun|12.5.06 @ 5:09PM|#

I'm sure once the government is done taxing the shit out of it, legal drugs will be just as expensive to the end-user as they are now.

But for any of it to happen, not only does the WOD have to end, but a cultural sea-change in attitudes toward taking pleasure would have to take place too.

|12.5.06 @ 5:48PM|#

"a decent scotch for twenty dollars a fifth?"

I would spend a little bit more and get Craggenmore... Last time I got it it was under 30 bucks, and it's not decent, it's good.

I am inclined to spend the money for Laphroaig (15 year), or Oban, but a nice Lagavulin does the trick.

Connemara is a peated single malt Irish Whiskey that is worth checking out.

http://www.connemarawhiskey.com/ Irish whiskey

Haven't yet liked a whisky with the word "glen" in the name.

|12.5.06 @ 6:16PM|#

Dan T. -

Well, during Prohibition all the drunk driving accidents happened in a back alley with a coat hanger.

|12.5.06 @ 6:47PM|#

Ask the mother whose child was killed by a drunk driver if the repeal of Prohibition has been all roses.

As a person who is capable of travelling between alternate universes, I would like to inform you that on the alternate Earth where Prohibition was never repealed, that child was killed anyway, by a SWAT team looking for alcohol and raiding the wrong house. They killed her dog too.

Not only that. Another child in that same neighborhood was killed in a similar incident. And you know what, Dan? That child would have grown up to be you!

So like you say, while the repeal of Prohibition was the best outcome on balance, some bad things happened too: A little more excessive drinking, and a few more trolls.

|12.5.06 @ 7:27PM|#

Do I hear, Dahlwinnie (spelling?) much less "analytical" than Glenlivet, though not as "peaty" as others. Give it a try.

As for cheap scotch, try Trader Joes they have a pretty good selection for reasonable prices. I think a fifth of Glenlivet is about 20 to 25 bucks, and they have about three or four under 35.

I don't know if you can get it hear, but a Scotch liquor called Glayva is excellent after dinner drink. Much better than Baileys in my humble opinion.

regards

joe dokes

|12.6.06 @ 10:25AM|#

To give the devil his due: it's kinda touching that Congress actually thought it required a constitutional amendment to ban booze, rather than just a statute passed under authority of the Commerce Clause.

AntónioCostaAmaral|12.11.06 @ 6:18PM|#

isn't the link broken?