Looking back at prohibition, the mainstream view is that it was a failure imposed by a bunch of church ladies.
But was America headed towards Russian levels of hard liquor consumption before prohibition?
You see all those westerns, pulling off a bottle of whisky was required?
What caused the tremendous decline in 1830?
I seem to recall from a history class long ago that liquor production was tied to grain production. That is, making whisky was something to do with your surplus corn, etc. As transportation became better, there were more markets for that surplus and therefore less consumption. I would imagine that this graph reflects a complex social and economic interaction.
