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The '''Anti-Saloon League''' was the leading organization [[lobbying ]] for [[Prohibition in the United States ]] in the early 20th century. The League brought together religious conservatives from many Protestant denominations and It was a key component of the [[Progressive Movement]]. It , and was strongest in the South and rural North, drawing heavy support from evangelical pietistic Protestant ministers and their congregations, especially Methodists, Baptists, Disciples and Congregationalists. It concentrated on legislation, and cared about how legislators voted, not whether they drank or not. Founded as a state society in [[Oberlin, Ohio|Oberlin]], [[Ohio]] in 1893, its influence spread rapidly. In 1895 it became a national organization and quickly rose to become the most powerful prohibition lobby in America, pushing aside its older competitors the [[Woman's Christian Temperance Union]] and the [[Prohibition Party]]. Its triumph was nationwide : in 1919, prohibition got written locked into the Constitution with passage of the [[Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|18th Amendment]]. The League lost momentum after 1919 and played only a small role in trying to enforce prohibition laws1920. It was decisively defeated when prohibition was repealed [[repeal]]ed in 1933.

Kerr (1980) and Odegard (1928) have explored its political innovations. The League was the first modern [[interest group|pressure group]] organized around one issue. Unlike earlier popular movements, it utilized bureaucratic methods learned from business to build a strong organization. The League's founder and first leader, [[Howard Hyde Russell]] (1855-1946), believed that the best leadership was selected, not elected. Russell built from the bottom up, shaping local leagues and raising the most promising young men to leadership at the local and state levels. This organizational strategy reinvigorated the [[temperance movement, which previously had been led part-time by Protestant ministers]].

Lamme (2004) shows the League used a multitiered approach in its attempts to secure a dry (prohibition) nation through national legislation and congressional hearings, the [[Scientific Temperance Federation]], and its [[American Issue Publishing House|American Issue Publishing Company]]. The ASLA League also used emotion and cognition in the style of such issues related to World War I as anti-German sentiment, patriotism, and rationing. Lamme (2003) explores the public relations approach used by the League as it tried to mobilize public opinion in favor of a dry, saloonless nation. It invented many of the modern techniques of public relations. The founders saw themselves as preachers fulfilling their religious duty of eliminating liquor in America.

The League lobbied at all levels of government for legislation to prohibit the manufacture or import of spirits, beer and wine. Ware (1989) explores its operations in Phoenix, Arizona. Ministers had launched several efforts to close Arizona [[bar (establishment)|saloon]]s after the 1906 creation of League chapters in Yuma, Tucson, and Phoenix. A League organizer from New York arrived in 1909, but the Phoenix chapter was stymied by local-option elections, whereby local areas could decide whether or not to allow saloons. League members pressured local police to take licenses from establishments that violated closing hours or served women and minors, and they provided witnesses to testify about these violations. One witness was Frank Shindelbower, a juvenile from a poor family, who testified several saloons had sold him liquor; as a result those saloons lost their licenses. However owners discovered that Shindelbower had perjured himself, and he was imprisoned. After the Arizona Gazette and other newspapers pictured Shindelbower as the innocent tool of the Anti-Saloon League, he was pardoned.

At As the state level the League had mixed results, usually doing best in rural and southern states. It made little headway in larger cities, or among liturgical church members such as Catholics, Jews, Episcopalians and German Lutherans. Pegram (1990) explains its success in [[Illinois ]] under William Hamilton Anderson. From 1900 and 1905 the League worked to obtain a local option referendum law and became an official church federation. Local Option was passed in on 7 May 1907 and by 1910 40 of Illinois' 102 counties and 1,059 of the state's townships and precincts had become dry, including some Protestant areas around Chicago. Despite these successes, after the Prohibition amendment was ratified in 1919, social problems such as organized crime ignored by the League undermined the public influence of the single-issue pressure group, and it faded in importance. Pegram (1997) uses its failure in [[Maryland ]] to explore the relationship between Southern Progressivism and national progressivism. The Maryland leader 1907-14 was William H. Anderson, but he was unable to adapt to local conditions, such as the large German element. The League failed to ally with local political bosses and attacked the Democratic Party. In Maryland, as in the rest of the South, Pegram concludes, traditional religious, political, and racial concerns constrained reform movements even as they converted Southerners to the new national politics of federal intervention and interest-group competition.

In 1909, the League moved its national headquarters from Washington, DC D.C. to [[Westerville, Ohio]], which had a [[Westerville, Ohio#History|reputation for drynesstemperance]]. The American Issue Publishing Company, the publishing arm of the League, was also in Westerville. [[Ernest Cherrington]] headed the company, which . It printed millins of so many leaflets - —over 40 tons of mail per month - or distribution through supportive churches—that Westerville was the smallest town to have a first class post office.

The League used [[pressure politics]], which it is credited with developing, in legislative battles. When it came to fighting against wet candidates, especially such as [[Al Smith]] in the presidential election of 1928, who ran for the League was less effective because its audience was already Republican. Unable to cope with the failures presidency of prohibition, especially bootlegging and organized crime as well as reduced government revenue, the League failed to counter the repeal forces, led by prominent Democrats, which helped [[Franklin DU. Roosevelt]] win in 1932S. A new Constitutional amendment passed easily in 1933 to repeal the 18th amendment, and the League lost its power1928. From 1948 until 1950 it was renamed Smith led the Temperance League, from 1950 opposition to 1964 the National Temperance Leagueprohibition, from 1964 the American Council on Alcohol Problemswhich was repealed in 1933.

A museum about the League is at the [[Westerville Public Library]]. From 1948 until 1950 it was renamed the Temperance League, from 1950 to 1964 the National Temperance League, from 1964 the [[American Council on Alcohol Problems]]. It remains true to its original goal. ==BibliographyReferences ==*Cherrington, Ernest, edAnti-Saloon League of America. ''Standard Encyclopedia Anti-Saloon League of the Alcohol ProblemAmerica Yearbook'' (6 vol 1930), comprehensive global coverage by dry experts. annual to 1933* ClarkCherrington, Norman HErnest. ''Deliver Us from Evil: An Interpretation History of American Prohibitionthe Anti-Saloon League'' (1976) a favorable view. 1913, by a conservative scholar; [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=102117203 online edition]senior official

* Hamm, Richard F. Hamm. ''Shaping the Eighteenth Amendment: Temperance Reform, Legal Culture, and the Polity, 1880-1920'' (1995) [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=98503656 online edition]

*Kerr, K. Austin. ''Organized for Prohibition: A New History of the Anti-Saloon League''. (Yale University Press, 1985), the standard scholarly history

* LernerLien, Michael AJerry. ''Dry Manhattan: Prohibition in New York City,The Speechmaking of the Anti-Saloon League'' (Harvard University Press; 2007) 352pp.University of Southern California, 1968* Odegard, Peter H. ''Pressure Politics: Story of the Anti-Saloon League.'' 1928, by a political scientist; the most influential study

* Ware, H. David. :The Anti-Saloon League Wages War in Phoenix, 1910: the Unlikely Case of Frank Shindelbower." ''Journal of Arizona History'' 1998 39(2): 141-154. Issn: 0021-9053 ==See also=Primary sources=*[[Board of Temperance Strategy]]*[[Prohibition leaders]]*[[Purley Baker]]*[[Temperance organizations]]*[[Westerville Public Library]]*[[World League Against Alcoholism]] (the league opposed alcohol rather than alcoholism) ==External links==*Anti-Saloon League of America[http://www. ''Anti-Saloon League of America Yearbook''ohiohistorycentral. annual to 1933org/entry.php?rec=820 Ohio History Central (Westerville)]*Cherrington, Ernest[http://www. ''History of the wpl.lib.oh.us/AntiSaloon/ Anti-Saloon League''. 1913, by senior official Museum]*[http://bookswww.googlenebraskahistory.comorg/books?id=l9sXAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=intitle:lib-arch/research/manuscripts/organize/anti-saloon.htm Anti-Saloon&lr=&num=30&as_brr=3 full text onlineLeague of Nebraska records] at [[Nebraska State Historical Society]]* ''A Souvenir Selection of the Anti-saloon Addresses Delivered at the Annual Convention'' (1895) 53 pages [http://bookswww.googlejames-dave.com/books?id=T90XAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=intitle:Anti-Saloon&lr=&num=30&as_brr=3 full text onlinealcohol2.html Alcohol and the Bible]by James H. Boyd