The Noble Experiment
The Eighteenth Amendment (1920) banned the making or selling of alcohol, which became known as prohibition.
Why did prohibition fail?
· Some people made their own liquor
· Bootleggers smuggled in liquor from Canada and the Caribbean
· Speakeasies, or illegal bars, opened throughout the nation.
· Prohibition encouraged gangsters, such as Al Capone, to smuggle liquor.
· The Twenty-first Amendment repealed prohibition in 1933.
· The Nineteenth Amendment (1920) gave women the right to vote.
· Alice Paul fought unsuccessfully for an equal rights amendment (ERA) until her death.
· Women increasingly worked outside of the home.
· Rising incomes and labor saving devices, such as washing machines, gave families more free time.
· Millions of Americans began to attend the movies regularly. Examples) Rudolph Valentino and Charlie Chapman
· Radios also became very popular during the 1920’s as families gathered around the radio to listen to music, comedies, and mysteries.
· In the 1920’s, the American car culture developed.
- people easily traveled out of the cities into the country
- suburbs grew as people moved from the cities
