Changes

In less than eight years -- from 1913 to 1920 -- four major amendments were added to the Constitution:  the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th amendments.  We have already discussed the 16th and 17th Amendments (do you recall what they were?), so now we review the 18th and 19th Amendments.

In less than eight years -- from 1913 to 1920 -- four major amendments were added to the Constitution:  the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th amendments.  We have already discussed the 16th and 17th Amendments (do you recall what they were?), so now we review the 18th and 19th Amendments.

The numerous amendments to the Constitution  

 

The progressive movement was part of this, and it supported the 16th Amendment (income tax), 17th Amendment (direct election of senators), and 19th Amendment (guaranteeing the right to vote to women nationwide).

 

The 18th Amendment was the unique result of a movement by Christian women against alcohol.  The harm on families due to alcohol was immense then, and now.  The social movement to rid American society of alcohol began as early as the 1840s and even established a "Prohibition Party" that won some elections in the 1910s, and still exists in weaker form today.  While the 18th Amendment is described as a failure today (it was repealed by the 21st Amendment), the "Roaring Twenties" was a fabulous success economically, culturally, and socially, and throughout that decade the 18th Amendment remained in effect to prohibit alcohol.  The 21st Amendment to repeal the 18th Amendment did not become part of the Constitution until 1933, when people argued that the sale of alcohol would help lift the nation out of the Great Depression (the Great Depression continued for nearly another decade anyway).

==James Madison's rejected amendments for the Bill of Rights==

==James Madison's rejected amendments for the Bill of Rights==