January 16th, 1920 was your last chance to buy a legal drink in the United States.

Bars and restaurants held wakes and passed out miniature coffins.

On January 17th, at 12.01 a.m. the 18th amendment went into effect and the Federal

Volstead Act would give law enforcement officials the power to enforce

prohibition. The New York Times reported then that Americans cheered the final moment of a moist

United States. This was the beginning of Prohibition. We were officially a dry country.

But we weren't really.

Prohibition made liquor sales and distribution illegal,

but it didn't stop people's thirst.

And in fact, you can think of the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, which said that the manufacture,

sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors in the country was prohibited,

as a change to our Constitution that created an entire criminal

underworld. That underworld depended on the smuggling of liquor

across the border.

President Hoover commissioned a lengthy report to address what to do about the enforcement of prohibition laws.

The final report published in 1931 was officially known as the National Commission on Law,

Observance and Enforcement, but it's also known as the Wickersham

report, after its chairman, George Wickersham.

He'd been the attorney general under President Taft.

The report made it clear that there were serious problems

with enforcing prohibition. Liquor was being smuggled from across the border from everywhere.

The report observed, transportation is by land, by water, and by air.

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