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Connecticut Goes Dry: The Experience of the Temperance and Prohibition Movements in Connecticut,...

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Connecticut Goes Dry: The Experience of the Temperance and Prohibition Movements in Connecticut, 1850-1933

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Identifier	Thesis 1864
Author	Brooks, Charles L.
Title	Connecticut Goes Dry: The Experience of the Temperance and Prohibition Movements in Connecticut, 1850-1933
Publisher	Central Connecticut State University
Date of Publication	2006
Resource Type	Master's Thesis
Abstract	On December 12, 2005, the small Connecticut town of Eastford held a referendum for its 1,600 citizens to decide if they would allow alcohol sales in their town. The following morning, the results were clear. Eastford voters decided 330 to 287 to allow the sales of beer and wine in restaurants with seating for more than 35 people. Thus ended Eastford's 130 year experiment with prohibition, and leaving the equally small town of Bridgewater as the only remaining town in Connecticut, where the sale of alcohol is banned. Whether it is Carry Nation chopping a barroom into kindling in Kansas, or a shoot out between gangsters and police in Chicago, temperance and prohibition have left indelible marks upon society. The temperance movement was one of the most popular social movements in the history of the United States and it, along with the Eighteenth Amendment, has left us with some very vivid imagery. The temperance movement itself has existed since the beginning of the country, though it began to increase its activity in the mid-nineteenth century through the hard work of its followers, and brought about one of the greatest social experiments ever, social control through legislation and Constitutional Amendment. From 1920 to 1933, the United States was subject to a level of violence that it had never before witnessed in time of peace. The temperance movement and the idea of a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting the use of liquor were not popular everywhere in the country, especially in the numerous cities that had developed. Opposition to the temperance movement was centered on the eastern seaboard between the cities of Boston and Baltimore. In the middle of the area lay the state of Connecticut. The concepts of temperance and prohibition were not very popular in Connecticut, as were illustrated by Connecticut's first attempt at the prohibition of alcohol. This study will show that the majority of the citizens, and to some degree the politicians in the state, cared very little for the ideas of temperance and prohibition. In addition, this study will attempt to explain why this was the situation in Connecticut. Despite the volumes that have been written on the subject of prohibition, historians have neglected to study the experience of prohibition in Connecticut. A few scholars in their discussions of prohibition across the country have briefly mentioned Connecticut's experience, but it is usually limited to a mention that Connecticut did not ratify the Eighteenth Amendment. This can hardly been seen as addressing the issue of the temperance movement and prohibition in Connecticut. This study will begin the examination of the temperance and prohibition movements in Connecticut in the 1850's. This is not because the 1850's were the beginning of the temperance movement in the United States, not by any means. Liquor laws in various forms had existed since 1629 when the Virginia Colonial Assembly ruled that ministers should not engage in excess drinking. The 1850's do not mark the beginning of the temperance movement in Connecticut either. Temperance in Connecticut can be traced back to the late eighteenth century when a group of Litchfield farmers agreed to promote temperance by ceasing the habit of paying their farm hands with distilled spirits. In the early nineteenth century, churches in the western district of Fairfield expressed alarm at the rise of intemperate behavior and as a result issued a pamphlet entitled "A Calm Dissuasive against Intemperance".
Subject	Prohibition -- Connecticut Temperance -- Connecticut
Department	Department of History
Advisor	Prescott, Heather Munro
Type	Text
Digital Format	application/pdf
Language	eng
OCLC number	713735042
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Connecticut Goes Dry: The Experience of the Temperance and Prohibition Movements in Connecticut, 1850-1933

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