Editing Volstead Act (section)

== Historical context ==
The Volstead Act had a number of contributing factors that led to its ratification in 1919. For example, the formation of the Anti-Saloon League in 1893.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book |last=Tyrrell |first=Ian |title=Transnational Nation |publisher=Palgrave |date=January 1, 2015 |isbn=9781137338549 |edition=2nd |location=London |pages=137–231}}</ref> The league used the after effects of [[World War I]] to push for national prohibition because there was a lot of prejudice and suspicion of foreigners following the war. Many reformers used the war to get measures passed and a major example of this was national prohibition.<ref name=":2" /> The league was successful in getting many states to ban alcohol prior to 1917 by claiming that to drink was to be pro-German and this had the intended results because many of the major breweries at the time had German names.<ref name=":2" /> Additionally, many saloons were immigrant-dominated which further supported the narrative that the [[Anti-Saloon League]] was pushing for. Another factor that led to the passage of the Volstead Act was the idea that in order to feed the allied nations there was a greater need for the grain that was being used to make whiskey. Prohibitionists also argued that the manufacture and transportation of liquor was taking away from the needed resources that were already scarce going into WWI. They argued that Congress would have conserved food and coal much earlier had not liquor interests been placed above public welfare.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Shaw |first1=Elton Raymond |last2=Wheeler |first2=Wayne Bidwell |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/247994942 |title=Prohibition: going or coming? The eighteenth amendment and the Volstead act; facts versus fallacies and suggestions for the future |date=1924 |publisher=Shaw Pub. Co |oclc=247994942}}</ref> This led to the War Time Prohibition Act in 1918. The case for wartime prohibition was strong and the prohibitionists could use their early successes under the necessities of mobilization to make the change permanent through a constitutional amendment in 1919.<ref name=":2" />
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