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However, consumption soon climbed as underworld entrepreneurs began producing "rotgut" alcohol which was full of dangerous diseases.
I don't think dangerous diseases is the correct phrase. "Caused many accidental poisonings" would be a better phrase. The fault of the home distillers was not one of contamination with bacteria or viruses or mold, as none of them could live in alcohol. The problem was bad distillation methods which lead to methanol being produced instead of ethanol, and methanol destroys your liver and your eyes first, so many people went blind and many people were poisoned and died from "bathtub gin" but none caught any dangerous diseases.
Is the reason known why the amendment specifically prohibited beverage alcohol, instead of merely giving congress the power to do so, as other amendments did? Was there a fear of lobbyism leading to a repeal of prohibition? -- 77.189.99.210 ( talk) 22:04, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
Did Connecticut ratify this or not? They are listed as one of two states to reject the amendment but also as the 46th state to ratify it. -- Shawn K. Quinn ( talk) 11:26, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
QUOTE: Woodrow Wilson: Which was the 28th President of the United States, he vetoed the 18th Amendment which was later ratified by congress and was called the Volstead Act. Which was enacted to carry out the Intent of the 18th Amendment.[2] President Wilson was the one that introduced the National Prohibition Act, also known as the Volstead Act. This act implemented the banning of alcoholic beverages as well as the production and the distribution of the beverages. This law was passed on July 22, 1919 with a vote of 287 to 100. Not too long after, the law was repealed with the passage of the 21st amendment to the Constitution. UNQUOTE Woodrow Wilson is a "who", not a "which". Presidents can't veto Constitutional Amendments. Then it says "President Wilson was the one that introduced the National Prohibition Act, also known as the Volstead Act." Um, are "introduce" and "veto" the same thing? They aren't. The Volstead act was introduced by Representative Andrew Volstead. I don't know how it was introduced in the Senate. Wilson didn't INTRODUCE the Volstead Act, but vetoed it (did NOT veto the 18th Amendment, couldn't), and got overridden. Whoever wrote this believes that the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act are the same thing. They are not. The 18th Amendment is what made it Constitutional for the houses of Congress to pass bills like the Volstead Act, which bills, if signed by the President or vetoed by the President but overridden, could not later be ruled un-Constitutional if such bills dealt on with the matters that the 18th Amendment lays out, because the 18th Amendment makes them specifically Constitutional. For instance the Supreme Court couldn't toss the Volstead Act on grounds of states' rights or inalienable personal liberty, since the 18th Amendment specifically empowers the Federal Government to trod on states' rights and individual liberty in these narrowly-confined matters. One thing that was required was legislation to define the Constitution's vague reference to "intoxicating", and that's done in the Volstead Act, not the Amendment. They are two different things. And whoever wrote this uses an informal style in which it is permissible to begin sentences with "which". Which is not the style for an encyclopedia. 2604:2000:C682:2D00:146:7506:94D4:E2EB ( talk) 23:33, 26 November 2017 (UTC)Christopher L. Simpson
To give just one example, take this sentence and footnote:
"Just after the Eighteenth Amendment's adoption, there was a significant reduction in alcohol consumption among the general public and particularly among low-income groups. There were less hospitalizations for alcoholism and less liver-related medical problems. However, consumption soon climbed as underworld entrepreneurs began producing "rotgut" alcohol which was full of dangerous diseases.[31]"
It is not possible for an educated adult to write that alcohol of any kind can be full of diseases, dangerous or otherwise. The sentence would make sense if the word 'diseases' was replaced by 'additives'. However, we cannot know if that was the writer's intent, or if it reflects information contained in the sourcing footnote.
One's next step might be to examine the footnote. Footnote 31 is a link to a history.com article:
http://www.history.com/topics/18th-and-21st-amendments
This article does not address the question of additives in 'rotgut' liquor. But something even more worriesome becomes apparent: There is considerable and literal overlap between this article and the wikipedia article. Which came first, one would like to know? Is the Wikipedia article cloning the history.com article, or is it a case of vice versa? Regardless, a footnote cannot be valid if it merely refers to identical text published elsewhere. In any case, the question of rotgut is not addressed.
This is but one example indicating that this article is in need of drastic editing by a competent historian. Busterbarker2008 ( talk) 09:59, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
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Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
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However, consumption soon climbed as underworld entrepreneurs began producing "rotgut" alcohol which was full of dangerous diseases.
I don't think dangerous diseases is the correct phrase. "Caused many accidental poisonings" would be a better phrase. The fault of the home distillers was not one of contamination with bacteria or viruses or mold, as none of them could live in alcohol. The problem was bad distillation methods which lead to methanol being produced instead of ethanol, and methanol destroys your liver and your eyes first, so many people went blind and many people were poisoned and died from "bathtub gin" but none caught any dangerous diseases.
Is the reason known why the amendment specifically prohibited beverage alcohol, instead of merely giving congress the power to do so, as other amendments did? Was there a fear of lobbyism leading to a repeal of prohibition? -- 77.189.99.210 ( talk) 22:04, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
Did Connecticut ratify this or not? They are listed as one of two states to reject the amendment but also as the 46th state to ratify it. -- Shawn K. Quinn ( talk) 11:26, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
QUOTE: Woodrow Wilson: Which was the 28th President of the United States, he vetoed the 18th Amendment which was later ratified by congress and was called the Volstead Act. Which was enacted to carry out the Intent of the 18th Amendment.[2] President Wilson was the one that introduced the National Prohibition Act, also known as the Volstead Act. This act implemented the banning of alcoholic beverages as well as the production and the distribution of the beverages. This law was passed on July 22, 1919 with a vote of 287 to 100. Not too long after, the law was repealed with the passage of the 21st amendment to the Constitution. UNQUOTE Woodrow Wilson is a "who", not a "which". Presidents can't veto Constitutional Amendments. Then it says "President Wilson was the one that introduced the National Prohibition Act, also known as the Volstead Act." Um, are "introduce" and "veto" the same thing? They aren't. The Volstead act was introduced by Representative Andrew Volstead. I don't know how it was introduced in the Senate. Wilson didn't INTRODUCE the Volstead Act, but vetoed it (did NOT veto the 18th Amendment, couldn't), and got overridden. Whoever wrote this believes that the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act are the same thing. They are not. The 18th Amendment is what made it Constitutional for the houses of Congress to pass bills like the Volstead Act, which bills, if signed by the President or vetoed by the President but overridden, could not later be ruled un-Constitutional if such bills dealt on with the matters that the 18th Amendment lays out, because the 18th Amendment makes them specifically Constitutional. For instance the Supreme Court couldn't toss the Volstead Act on grounds of states' rights or inalienable personal liberty, since the 18th Amendment specifically empowers the Federal Government to trod on states' rights and individual liberty in these narrowly-confined matters. One thing that was required was legislation to define the Constitution's vague reference to "intoxicating", and that's done in the Volstead Act, not the Amendment. They are two different things. And whoever wrote this uses an informal style in which it is permissible to begin sentences with "which". Which is not the style for an encyclopedia. 2604:2000:C682:2D00:146:7506:94D4:E2EB ( talk) 23:33, 26 November 2017 (UTC)Christopher L. Simpson
To give just one example, take this sentence and footnote:
"Just after the Eighteenth Amendment's adoption, there was a significant reduction in alcohol consumption among the general public and particularly among low-income groups. There were less hospitalizations for alcoholism and less liver-related medical problems. However, consumption soon climbed as underworld entrepreneurs began producing "rotgut" alcohol which was full of dangerous diseases.[31]"
It is not possible for an educated adult to write that alcohol of any kind can be full of diseases, dangerous or otherwise. The sentence would make sense if the word 'diseases' was replaced by 'additives'. However, we cannot know if that was the writer's intent, or if it reflects information contained in the sourcing footnote.
One's next step might be to examine the footnote. Footnote 31 is a link to a history.com article:
http://www.history.com/topics/18th-and-21st-amendments
This article does not address the question of additives in 'rotgut' liquor. But something even more worriesome becomes apparent: There is considerable and literal overlap between this article and the wikipedia article. Which came first, one would like to know? Is the Wikipedia article cloning the history.com article, or is it a case of vice versa? Regardless, a footnote cannot be valid if it merely refers to identical text published elsewhere. In any case, the question of rotgut is not addressed.
This is but one example indicating that this article is in need of drastic editing by a competent historian. Busterbarker2008 ( talk) 09:59, 15 December 2017 (UTC)