"Among them [members of the Association Againts the Prohibition Amendment who had originally supported the Anti-Salloon League and Prohibition] was Hentry Bourne Joy, the retired president of Packard Motor. Joy had donated to the ASL and favored the Eighteenth Amendment. But in the mid-1920s, horrified by the lawlessness rampant in the region near his home in northern Michigan, he threw his weight, and his money, behind the AAPA. So did the three Du Pont brothers, Pierre, Irenee, and Lammot. Irenee was particularly vocal about the evils associated with Prohibition: He was shocked by the amount of money earned by bootleggers, money that was not taxed and so did not contribute to the national treasury or the nation's well-being. He was appalled, too, by the extent to which a taste for hard liquor had taken hold among young people. Pierre support the AAPA for different reasons: He was outraged that private property in the form of breweries and distillaries had been shut down, and through no fault of the owners. He also abhorred the intrusion of federal power into private lives, a clear violation, he believed, of the treasured American concept of states' rights. All of it--the amendment itself, the shoddy and usually corrupt enforcement, and the increase in crime and invasions of privacy--constituted 'an outrage to American institutions'.

These ideas resonated with a nation weary of arguing, weary of crime, and by the time the Wickersham report appeared, already weary of an economic disaster that had barely begun. As the depression deepened, more critics called for repeal in the name of taxation. They reminded Americans that for decades, brewers, distillers, and vintners had paid heavy taxes, monies that had dried up when the Eighteenth became law. Bring alcohol back, and jobs, paychecks, and tax revenues would return, too."

We know the ultimate result. Americans came to their senses and repealed the 18th, and yet the same situation adheres to this day for an array of other intoxicating substances including marijuana and our sitting President claims legalization of these drugs is not a good way to raise tax revenue at a time when the Federal government is handing out billion dollar stacks like lollipops. I take this as evidence that as much better as Obama is than that unfortunate non-Abortion G. W. Bush and as happy as I am that I voted for him, our president, being a Democrat (one of the two parties controlling the power establishment) is not and cannot be an agent for real change in the Federal government.