Prohibition in Canada was a ban on alcoholic beverages that arose in various stages, from local municipal bans in the late 19th century (extending to the present in some cases), to provincial bans in the early 20th century, and national prohibition (a temporary wartime measure) from 1918 to 1920. The relatively large and powerful beer and alcohol manufacturing sector, and the huge working class that purchased their products, failed to convince any of the governments to reverse their stance on prohibition. Most provinces repealed their bans in the 1920s, though alcohol was illegal in Prince Edward Island from 1901 to 1948. By comparison, the Ontario Temperance Act was in effect from 1916 to 1927.
As legislation prohibiting the consumption of alcohol was repealed, it was typically replaced with regulation imposing restrictions on the sale of alcohol to minors, and with excise taxes on alcoholic products.
Origins Temperance movement
Canadians drank heavily during the 19th century. The 1851 census of Upper Canada recorded 1,999 taverns or one to 478 people. Drunkenness, fighting, domestic abuse, and household impoverishment were rampant.
Prohibition was mostly spurred on by the organized crusades against social evil launched by the temperance movement. They targeted drinking establishments, which they viewed as the source of societal ills and misery. Initially, the temperance movement in Canada, which began in the 1820s, was largely concerned with the consumption of strong liquor, while beer, wine, and cider were not considered to be a significant problem. However, by the 1840s, "total abstinence" temperance societies were the norm, and all alcoholic beverages, including those with lighter alcohol content, were considered dangerous. Inspired by the Maine Law of 1851, which saw legal prohibition in the U.S. state of Maine, the temperance movement in Canada shifted to the strategy of legal coercion to advance the cause of sobriety.
The main temperance organizations that emerged at the beginning of the prohibition era in Canada were the Dominion Alliance for the Total Suppression of the Liquor TrafficSee The Journal of the Synod of the Church of England in the Diocese of Huron, Nineteenth Session, June 20-22, 1876. pp. 38, 45, 51, 142, 165. The Dominion Alliance formed just prior to the 1876 session and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) of Canada. Protestant denominations, including Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists, generally supported prohibition and campaigned for it beginning in the late 19th century. Notable advocates included Archibald McKillop, a Scottish-Canadian blind poet and orator from the Eastern Townships who promoted sobriety through public speeches and verse. Prohibition was an important aspect of the Protestant Social Gospel.
The WCTU established itself throughout much of Canada and the United States as one of the largest and most influential contributors to the temperance movement. One way the WCTU attempted to spread the message of temperance was by pressuring provincial governments for temperance instruction in schools. In 1892, under pressure from the WCTU and other temperance organizations, Nova Scotia enacted legislation requiring schools to teach students about the effects of alcohol on the human body. By the end of the 19th century, through the efforts of the WCTU, most provinces had at least some temperance instruction in school. The WCTU also looked outside of the formal school systems to promote temperance ideals to children, and also spread their message to Sunday schools, and youth groups.
The Dominion Alliance was an umbrella organization that "included representatives from most temperance and prohibition societies," including the WCTU. The group lobbied governments at various levels to enact prohibitory laws, and other legislation that advanced the cause of temperance. They submitted a memorial, or a written statement of principles, to the nineteenth session of the Huron Diocese's Anglican Synod in 1876. In it they stated:
Early local prohibition laws Some legislative steps toward prohibition were taken in the 19th century. The passage of the Canada Temperance Act of 1864, also called the Dunkin Act, after Christopher Dunkin, in the Province of Canada, allowed any county or city to forbid the sale of liquor by majority vote in a referendum.
After Canadian Confederation, the power of local option votes was extended to the rest of Canada via the Canada Temperance Act of 1878. It was known as the Scott Act after its sponsor, Sir Richard William Scott. It allowed any county or city to opt into prohibition if it was supported by a majority in a local vote. Under the CTA, the sale of alcohol for sacramental or medicinal usage remained legal.
Local option votes resulted in more than 240 places in Ontario being under local option prohibition by 1912.Edmonton Bulletin, 5 November 1912
1898 federal referendum
An official, but non-binding, 1898 prohibition plebiscite was held with 51 per cent voting in favour of prohibition, and 49 per cent against. Voter turnout was low, at 44 per cent. Prohibition had a majority in all provinces except Quebec, where a strong 80 per cent voted against it. The main factor was religion. Pietistic Protestants, such as Methodists, Presbyterians and Scandinavian Lutherans, were strongly in support. Liturgical or high-church Protestants, such as Anglicans and German Lutherans were in opposition; the Catholic population, both French and Irish, were strongly opposed. Urban areas were more opposed than rural. Economic wealth and class apparently made little difference.
Despite a prohibition majority, Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier's government chose not to introduce a federal bill on prohibition, because of strong opposition in Quebec and low voter turnout. As a result, prohibition in Canada was enacted in a patchwork manner through laws passed at the provincial level during the first twenty years of the 20th century.
Legislation
First Nations First Nations were subject to prohibitory alcohol laws under the Indian Act of 1876. This was an attempt on the part of the Canadian government to facilitate assimilation, because for an indigenous person to possess alcohol they had to become a Canadian citizen through enfranchisement and to be eligible for enfranchisement indigenous people had to demonstrate sobriety. The laws also reflected a widespread false belief among North Americans, that indigenous peoples were more prone to alcohol dependency, known as the "firewater myth".Campbell 2008, p. 106. Sections of the Indian Act regarding liquor were not repealed for over a hundred years, until 1985.Campbell 2008, p. 117.
PEI first to adopt prohibition Prince Edward Island implemented prohibition as early as 1901."The Prohibition years in PEI" https://canadaehx.com/2021/10/09/the-prohibition-years-of-pei/ Prince Edward Island finally repealed prohibition in 1948.
Provincial and federal prohibition during and after the First World War During the First World War more provinces joined PEI in having prohibition. Most of the provinces enacted prohibition during the First World War, and opted to extend the ban on alcohol following the end of the war. Provinces held referendums on the issue. Quebec was unusual in that it adopted prohibition in 1919 and quickly repealed it due to intense public pressure.
The First World War was an important factor in the success of prohibition efforts in Canada at the beginning of the 20th century. Many believed that prohibition would create a Canadian society worthy of the sacrifices of soldiers overseas. The argument was also raised that prohibition would benefit the war effort since it would prevent waste and inefficiency. Some also considered the barroom a place where "foreigners" congregated and "plotted" against the British Empire, and therefore the war effort. As former opponents of prohibition became silenced, lest they be judged as unpatriotic, provinces began to implement prohibition.
Following the 1917 Canadian election, in March 1918 the federal government as a war measure made it illegal to manufacture "intoxicating" drinks. The federal government introduced national prohibition by an Order in Council that became effective on 1 April 1918. It prohibited the importation of alcohol of more than 2.5 per cent into Canada, the inter-provincial trade of alcohol, and included a ban on production. The wartime ban expired a year after the conclusion of the war. This was the first and last time that national prohibition on the production, distribution, and consumption of alcohol was enacted in Canada.
The elimination of alcoholic beverages made a difference in Canadian society. The Ontario Alliance for the Total Suppression of the Liquor Trade stated in 1922 that the number of convictions for offences associated with drink had declined from 17,413 in 1914 to 5,413 in 1921, and drunkenness cases had dropped from 16,590 in 1915 to 6,766 in 1921.J.M. Bumsted, "The Peoples of Canada: A Post-Confederation History", Third Edition, 260 By the end of prohibition, nearly three quarters of beer breweries had closed. It was only in the second half of the 20th century that a significant number of new breweries opened again.
Alcohol production and prohibition in Ontario
Despite having prohibition from 1916 until 1927 in Ontario, the government allowed for numerous exceptions. Wineries were exempted from closure, and various breweries and distilleries remained open for the export market. In Hamilton, Ontario, Rocco Perri specialized in exporting liquor from old Canadian distilleries, such as Seagram and Gooderham and Worts, to the United States, and helped these companies obtain a large share of the American market. In London, Ontario, Harry Low and his group of rum-runners bought the Carling Brewery, while the Labatt family left the operations to the manager Edmund Burke. The fact that the "export" might be by small boat from Windsor across the river to Detroit only helped the province's economy. Rum-running occurred in other provinces as well.
Throughout the prohibition period, Ontario-made wines remained legal in Ontario and some have argued that Ontario never had prohibition. The government allowed the sale of light beer, considered to be non-intoxicating (and generally reviled by drinkers) in 1923, but it did not repeal the legislation creating prohibition until 1927, replacing it with the Liquor Control Act and creating the Liquor Control Board of Ontario to enforce the act.Malleck "Niagara wine and the regulatory environment: 1850s-1944" in The World of Niagara Wine, ed. Michael Ripmeester, Phillip Gordon Mackintosh, and Christopher Fullerton (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2013). Although some might argue the light beer amendment of 1923 ended prohibition, there is a general consensus among recent historians that 1927 is the date of repeal.Craig Heron, Booze: A Distilled History (Toronto: Between the Lines Press, 2003); Malleck Try to Control Yourself: The regulation of public drinking in post-prohibition Ontario, 1927-1944 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2012). The year 1923 is the date set by Gerald Hallowell, in Prohibition in Ontario, 1919-1923 (Toronto: Ontario Historical Society, 1972)