The Temperance Movement by DK https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9 Made with a curious mind en-us 2016-12-17 00:48:14 UTC 2025-09-26 12:58:20 UTC hello@padlet.com dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149258 The temperance movement began in the early 19th century (around the 1820s). Before this, although there were pieces published against drunkenness and excess,[1] total abstinence from alcohol (i.e. teetotalism) was very rarely advocated or practiced. There was also a concentration on hard spirits rather than on abstinence from alcohol and on moral reform rather than legal measures against alcohol.[]]> 2016-12-17 00:48:52 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149258 The temperance movement is a social movement against the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Temperance movements typically criticize excessive alcohol consumption, promote complete abstinence (teetotalism), or use its political influence to press the government to enact alcohol laws to regulate the availability of alcohol or even its complete prohibition. dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149375 2016-12-17 00:54:30 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149375 The movement existed in a matrix of unrest and intellectual ferment in which such other social ills as slavery, neglect and ill-treatment of marginalized people, were addressed by liberals and conservatives alike. Sometimes called the First Reform Era, running through the 1830s and '40s, it was a period of inclusive humanitarian reform.The first statewide success for the temperance movement was in Maine, which passed a law on June 2, 1851, which served as model for other states. Proponents suggested that it was motivated by a justified concern for the public welfare, but not all agreed. An anonymous letter which appeared in the United States Magazine and Democratic Review (May 1852) suggested that: dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149742 2016-12-17 01:13:47 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149742 The sphere of individual liberty must be shrunken, indeed, if it cannot enclose all that lies within a man's skin, and the powers of the ruler, extensive indeed, if they can reach down the citizen's throat and explore his digestive organs. It is not mere bombast to declare that the esophagus, the duodenum, lacticals, and capillary ducts of free-born Americans are, and of right should be, forever inviolable; and that if the Declaration of Independence does not avail to save the contents of our stomachs and bladders from chemical analysis and legislative discussion, it is full time to make another declaration that shall mean something. dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149771 2016-12-17 01:15:03 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144149771 In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, various factors contributed to an epidemic of alcoholism that went hand-in-hand with spousal abuse, family neglect, and chronic unemployment. Americans used to drinking lightly alcoholic beverages like cider "from the crack of dawn to the crack of dawn" began ingesting far more alcohol as they drank more of strong, cheap beverages like rum (in the colonial period) and whiskey (in the post-Revolutionary period).[1] Popular pressure for cheap and plentiful alcohol led to relaxed ordinances on alcohol sales. dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144175154 2016-12-17 16:23:15 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144175154 Temperance birthed an entire genre of theatre. This was first seen in 1825, as The Forgers, a dramatic poem written by John Blake White, premiered at the Charleston Theatre in Charleston, South Carolina. The next significant temperance drama to debut was titled "Fifteen Years of a Drunkard's Life", written by Douglas Jerrold in 1841. As the movement began to grow and prosper, these dramas became more popular among the general public. The Drunkard by W.H. Smith premiered in 1841 in Boston, running for 144 performances before being produced at P.T. Barnum's American Museum on lower Broadway. The play was wildly popular and is often credited with the entrance of the temperance narrative into mainstream American theatre. It continued to be a staple of New York's theatre scene all the way until 1875. "The Drunkard" follows the typical format of a temperance drama: the main character has an alcohol-induced downfall, and he restores his life from disarray once he denounces drinking for good at the play's end. Temperance drama continued to grow as a genre of theatre, fostered by the advent of the railroad as a form of transportation. This enabled theatre companies to be much more mobile, traveling from city to city. Temperance drama would even reach as far as the West Coast, as David Belasco's adaptation of Émile Zola's novel "Drink" premiered at the Baldwin Theatre in San Francisco in 1879. The image titled The Drunkards Progress shown in the top of the article, gives us a representation of the temperance movement. This image depicts the progress of a drunk man, slowly the woman disappears, and the mans night ends in death. This picture shows us that drinking is social but also brings poverty upon people as well as death and loneliness. dasmend12 https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144175378 2016-12-17 16:27:07 UTC https://padlet.com/dasmend12/qjli6jhggma9/wish/144175378