Unpopularity of prohibition and repeal movementAs early as 1925, journalist H. L. Mencken believed that Prohibition was not working. As the prohibition years continued, more of the countrys populace came to see prohibition as illustrative of class distinctions, a law unfairly biased in its administration favoring social elites. "Prohibition worked best when directed at its primary target: the working-class poor." Historian Lizabeth Cohen writes: A rich family could have a cellar-full of liquor, but if a poor family had a bottle of home-brew, there would be trouble. Working-class people were inflamed by the fact that their employers could dip into a cache of private stock while they, the employees, were denied a similar indulgence.
Indeed, before the date that the Eighteenth Amendment became national law, many of the upper classes stockpiled alcohol for home consumption. They bought out the inventories of warehouses, saloons, club store rooms, they emptied out liquor retailers and wholesalers. American lawmakers themselves followed these practices at the highest levels of government. President Woodrow Wilson moved his own supply of alcoholic beverages to his Washington residence after his term of office ended. His successor, Warren G. Harding relocated his own large supply into the White House after inauguration.
In October 1930, just two weeks before the Congressional midterm elections, bootlegger George Cassiday, "the man in the green hat," came forward and told how he had bootlegged for ten years for Congress. One of the few bootleggers ever to tell his story, he wrote five front page articles in The Washington Post. He estimated that eighty percent of congressmen and senators drank, even though these same people were the ones passing dry laws. This had a significant impact on the midterm election, which saw Congress shift from a dry Republican majority to a wet Democratic majority. The Democrats understood that Prohibition was unpopular and called for its repeal.
Does anybody see any parallels with today's fight over Obamacare? Switch the parties, but history is repeating itself. The politicians are doing for themselves the opposite of what they're mandating for the rest of the country. Waivers from Obamacare for politicians and big business, but not for individuals.
-PJ
Why not wait a few months for the effects of Obamacare to set in.
We're in the fight now, but I don't believe all the GOP candidates will hold the line.