The National Prohibition Movement

Prohibition played a large role in the rise of organizes crime. With the belief that alcohol was a dangerous drug and the route to disruption in the communities and family structure, prohibitionists pushed to ban the sale of alcohol. They believed it was responsibility of the government to intervene and prohibit its sales (Lyman 2015), thus subsequently creating the National Prohibition movement. With alcohol now banned, it created a high demand in the black market and created a gold mine for crime (Lyman, 2015). Although crime existed prior to the prohibition era, it would see a new extent of the meaning throughout this time. Petty gangster began to monopolize the alcohol industry (illegally) and became millionaires by engaging in lucrative criminal operations. These criminal operations included bootlegging, speakeasies and smuggling. What was once a petty thug with little reign, now gained dominance throughout their community and managed to create a criminal empire that provides them with not only wealth, but power. This power could be seen with the merge of prohibition and the political machine in Chicago, thus creating the most notorious criminal organization in U,S, History, the mob. The mob was full of ruthless, heartless men who all had a common goal, to make money. They would do whatever necessary to not only protect their illegal activities but also to expand their criminal empire. Local gangsters not only controlled the alcohol industry, but they also controlled the police. They used bribery and corruption to convince law enforcement to look the other

(2015) Organized Crime, Sixth Edition, Pearson Education, Inc., Publishing as Prentice Hall

Sandbrook, D. (2012), How Prohibition backfired and gave America an era of gangsters and speakeasies, The Guardian, information retrieved from: