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Rare FDR Satire Revue from New York Legislative Correspondents Celebrating End of Prohibition
Rare FDR Satire Revue from New York Legislative Correspondents Celebrating End of Prohibition
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Description:

Franklin Roosevelt
Albany, NY, February 23, 1933
Rare FDR Satire Revue from New York Legislative Correspondents Celebrating End of Prohibition
Pamphlet/Booklet
[FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT.] Albany Legislative Correspondents' Association, Foam Sweet Foam: A Rollicking Revue Rotating on Resurrection of Bouncing Beverages, program held at Ten Eyck Hotel Rathskeller, Albany, NY, February 23, 1933. 16 pp., 8.125" x 11.75". Full-color cover; two-color interior; minor soiling to cover; very good. Rare—we cannot locate another example.

The repeal of prohibition was a central issue in the election of 1932, and Congress passed a proposed Twenty-First Amendment to the United States Constitution on February 20, 1933, repealing the Eighteenth Amendment. Within ten months, enough states had ratified the proposed amendment for President Franklin D. Roosevelt to announce its passage to the nation.

This program for a revue sponsored by the Albany Legislative Correspondents' Association of the State of New York features an overview of the program; a toast list, including "Hon. Franklin D. Roosevelt / The President-elect of the United States"; the menu; lyrics to seven songs; and three political cartoons by Jerry Costello, including one entitled "Plenty of Pieces, But They Don't Fit (Normal Time Three Months)" that pictures Roosevelt looking at puzzle pieces with potential cabinet members' names on them.

The Legislative Correspondents' Association was composed of newspaper reporters from all sections of the state who were on duty at the capitol in Albany during the legislative session. In 1933, they moved their annual stunt dinner to the much earlier date of February 23, so President-elect Roosevelt could attend. Roosevelt had attended the annual event during his four years as governor and several other times as state senator and assistant secretary of the Navy. Roosevelt did attend, as did former governor and presidential candidate Alfred E. Smith and current Governor Herbert H. Lehman.

Historical Background
Nationwide prohibition was the result of decades of effort by the temperance movement, who argued that the widespread consumption of alcohol contributed to poverty, industrial accidents, immoral behavior, and violence. In 1906, the Anti-Saloon League began a campaign at the state level, and by 1916, twenty-three states had already passed laws against saloons as a progressive reform.

The Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibited the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors. Congress passed the proposed amendment in December 1917. In 1918 and early 1919, forty-five of the forty-eight states ratified it, and it became part of the Constitution in January 1919. Although President Woodrow Wilson vetoed the Volstead Act that served as enabling legislation for the Eighteenth Amendment in October 1919, Congress overrode his veto, and Prohibition began in January 1920.

Although the amendment did not ban the consumption of alcohol, it did make it difficult to obtain alcoholic beverages legally. Over the next decade, mass disobedience of prohibition laws and smuggled liquor created a culture of nightclubs and organized crime in cities and the production of sometimes lethal homemade liquor throughout the nation. Prosecutions of liquor distributors clogged the legal system and crowded prisons. By the late 1920s, public sentiment increasingly turned against Prohibition.

In 1932, Democratic presidential candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed the repeal of Prohibition as part of his campaign. In a campaign address on August 27, 1932, he said, "But the methods adopted since the World War with the purpose of achieving a greater temperance by the forcing of Prohibition have been accompanied in most parts of the country by complete and tragic failure. I need not point out to you that general encouragement of lawlessness has resulted; that corruption, hypocrisy, crime and disorder have emerged, and that instead of restricting, we have extended the spread of intemperance. This failure has come for this very good reason: we have depended too largely upon the power of governmental action instead of recognizing that the authority of the home and that of the churches in these matters is the fundamental force on which we must build. The recent recognition of this fact by the present Administration is an amazing piece of hindsight. There are others who have had foresight. A friend showed me recently an unpublished letter of Henry Clay, written a hundred years ago. In this letter Clay said that the movement for temperance ‘has done great good and will continue to do more' but ‘it will destroy itself whenever it resorts to coercion or mixes in the politics of the country.'"

With the country mired in the Great Depression by 1932, reversing the Eighteenth Amendment held out the possibility of creating jobs and increasing revenue by legalizing and taxing the liquor industry. Roosevelt's landslide victory over incumbent President Herbert Hoover meant the end of Prohibition. In February 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing a Twenty-first Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the Eighteenth. Fearing that the temperance lobby remained too strong in state legislatures, Congress chose to have the amendment ratified by state conventions chosen for the purpose, rather than by state legislatures. It remains the only constitutional amendment to be ratified by this method.

Between April and December 1933, the requisite thirty-six states (three-fourths) ratified the Amendment. On December 5, 1933, three states—Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Utah—became the last three states necessary to ratify the proposed amendment, and Prohibition was over. Maine ratified the amendment the following day, and Montana followed in August 1934.

Because the states retained control over the manufacture, sale, and distribution of alcoholic beverages, a few states continued to prohibit alcohol after Prohibition's end, but all had abandoned the ban by 1966, when 19 of Mississippi's counties voted to legalize alcohol.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 8.125" x 11.75"
  • Medium: Pamphlet/Booklet

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