Temperance is always a desired state of being. Some seek and find it on their own. Others would like to, but do not.
Others like to impose temperance on those they regard as intemperate. The Women’s Christian Temperance Union was able to impose temperance on our entire nation.
As a result, organized crime was able to corrupt most large cities and state governments dominated by big-city machines.
The WCTU was also interested in Protecting The Children. They began to work for agencies to increase the power of government in education, labor, nutrition. Busy, busy, busy.
Today, those who want to help the children figure prominently in Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
They go beyond getting drunk drivers off the road. By reducing the amount of alcohol that meets the legal requirement of “intoxicated”, they make millions more people into lawbreakers. State budgets are balanced on the backs of the newly defined “drunken bum”.
Just as those who profited from the WCTU’s ability to pass laws always bought votes for Prohibition, today those who benefit from increased fines and jail terms support MADD.
