HomeIn the late seventeenth century, Reverend Increase Mather, whom was probably the most influential puritan minister of his  time, said that alcohol was a "creature of God and men should enjoy it without abusing it."  However, no one cared at that  time, after all, men, woman and  even children were drinking large portions of alcohol daily without the feeling that they  were doing anything wrong. Alcohol was part of their daily life, and almost everyone was addicted to it.

It was until late 1700s that some people started being concerned about the amount of alcohol that people were drinking. By 1800, abstinence pledges were introduced in churches and by 1833, 6,000 societies had been formed to support alcohol prohibition.

After many years of anti-liquor movements organized by the "Dries", people in favor of prohibition, the Congress voted for prohibition at the end of 1917. Even then the "Wets", people against prohibition, were confident that the 18th Amendment would not be ratified by the 36 necessary states in the time limit of 7 years, but to people's surprise, it took only 13 months for the amendment to be ratified.