Staff Pick: The School Room Against the Bar Room

The School Room Against the Bar Room

Collection: James Yadkin Joyner Papers (Manuscript Collection #345) 
Staff Person: Dale Sauter

Today’s staff pick features a broadside (circa 1919) entitled “The School Room Against the Bar Room,” in which James Yadkin Joyner (Joyner Library’s namesake) offers his opinion on alcohol use.  At the time, Joyner was serving as the State Superintendent of Public Education of North Carolina, a term he held from 1902-1919.

The Beginning of Prohibition

The Volstead Act was passed in October 1919 over President Wilson’s veto.  This act was also known as the National Prohibition Act that officially designated alcohol as an illegal substance and putting forth punishments for the manufacture of it.  Prohibition did reduce some of society’s social ailments that came with the overuse of alcohol.  However, along with the law came major increases in crime on a large scale, as the product went underground.  Finally, in December 1933, the Twenty-first Amendment was ratified which repealed the previous Eighteen Amendment.  This now officially made alcohol legal in the United States once again.

Source:  Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_in_the_United_States