nness, and commentators see this as a result of the new world of industrialism and social turmoil then coming into existence (Clark 13).
Various temperance groups had suggested outright prohibition of alcohol beginning in the nineteenth century, and early in this century some groups, such as the Anti-Saloon League, declared themselves in favor of national prohibition by Constitutional amendment. In 1913, the Anti-Saloon League held a parade in Washington led by children, with four thousand members of the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) following. These marchers met with Congressman Richard Hobson and Senator Morris Sheppard and handed them copies of a proposed Eighteenth Amendment. This was then opposed by the U.S. Brewers' Association, but the incompetence of this organization in carrying out its opposition may be one of the reasons the Eighteenth Amendment eventually did pass. The Anti-Saloon League and the WCTU were sympathetic to equal rights issues, for instance, while the brewers and distillers offered active opposition to women's suffrage. The brewers were also involved in questionable election practices in Texas and Pennsylvania, creating further antagonism. Because the industry was making no effort to curb the abuses of the saloon, public opinion sided with the Prohibitionists (Mendelson and Mello 76-77).
Since 1914 was an election year, the Anti-Saloon League mobilized its forces to elect a majority of Prohibitionists to the next Congress and produced a massive amount of literature attacking the saloon and the brewers. More Prohibitionists were elected, but their number still fell short of what was needed until after the 1916 elections. The tensions of World War I threatened to overwhelm the issue of Prohibition, but it was now possible to argue that there was a need for food conservation and that the liquor industry was putting beer before country. The brewers showed inept...