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Title: Congress had their own bootlegger during Prohibition, so senators and congressmen could still drink alcohol
Source:
Vintage News
URL Source: http://www.thevintagenews.com/2017/ ... men-could-still-drink-alcohol/
Published: Feb 15, 2017
Author: Staff
Post Date: 2017-03-06 08:41:10 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 1278
Comments: 3
Remember George Orwell’s famous quote from Animal Farm that “all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”? Well, the story of George L. Cassiday, Jr. and how he supplied senators and members of Congress with alcohol ten years through the Alcohol prohibition seems like the perfect story that matches Orwell’s quote. Cassiday had taken on bootlegging following a struggle to find a job after WWI. In fact, he became the leading Congressional bootlegger during the controversial ban across the US in the 1920’s. Though usage of alcohol was illegal for all citizens except for medical or similar purposes, apparently it was not an issue for congressmen and senators. “A friend of mine told me that liquor was bringing better prices on Capitol Hill than anywhere else in Washington and that a living could be made supplying the demand,” he wrote in the Washington Post, in one of the six front page articles he published once his illegal actions were highlighted in 1930. George’s articles provided other intriguing facts, for instance, that his first customers had been two southern congressmen who had voted the Eighteenth Amendment and its enforcement, the Volstead Act, the two legislation that had effectively established the prohibition. After his second arrest on February 1930, Cassiday withdrew from bootlegging activities, and during the fall that same year, he went on to write the Washington Post articles. The shared information was sensational and pointed to the Congressional hypocrisy. He had shared how his illegal business started, from where he supplied the booze and how it was smuggled. George also spoke of how the Congress provided him the office to administrate all these activities. According to Cassiday, he had met most members of Congress during those ten years of bootlegging, writing, “I would say that four out of five senators and congressmen consume liquor either at their offices or their homes.” Seemingly, the senators had been a bit more cautious. Aside admitting responsibility for bootlegging, Cassiday also said that Congress was accountable as well, writing, “Considering that I took the risk and did the leg work from 1920 to 1930, I am more than willing to let the general public decide how I stack up with the senator or representative which ordered the stuff and consumed it on the premises of transporting it to their home”. His final article was published exactly one week before the midterm election day in 1930 and directly contributed to the voting results. As the Republicans were defeated in the voting, the power shifted to a newly elected Democratic majority. The Prohibition was canceled by 1933. After the 1930 arrest, Cassiday served 18 months in jail, though he never spent a night sleeping in prison. He was allowed to sign out at night and come back to prison the next morning. Later, he worked in a shoe factory and hotels around Washington. From the bootlegging days, Cassiday kept a “black book” that included information about each customer and their purchases; his wife destroyed the book, and the exact names were never revealed to the public. All we have are his words admitting that those customers were mostly members of the Congress. Cassiday is also remembered as the “man in the green hat,” and in 2012, the first post-Prohibition distillery in Washington launched “Green Hat Gin,” named after him. Read another story from us: Prohibition and speakeasies in the US The prohibition remained a notorious amendment in US history and is also related to speculated radical enforcement, additionally employed by the government. Allegedly, the most drastic measure was when federal officials considered putting poison in industrial alcohols, which were sometimes stolen from producers by bootleggers, and then resold as drinkable spirits. The officials believed that a little poison could scare people away and make them give up drinking. Supposedly, the radical measure took the lives of over 10,000 people.
Photo of George Cassiday in 1930. Cassiday managed his bootlegging activities out of the congressional Cannon House Office Building in Washington from 1920 until 1925 when he was first arrested. From 1925 to 1930, he operated out of the Russel Senate Office Building
Black-and-white photograph of a policeman standing alongside wrecked car and cases of moonshine liquor, 1922. Source: Library of Congress
Removal of liquor during prohibition
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#1. To: Deckard (#0)
Brings to mind JFK and his stockpile of Cuban cigars. DailyMail, 2012: How Kennedy bought 1,200 hand rolled Cuban cigars just hours before he ordered blockade of communist state 50 years ago JFK, he said, called him into his office and said he needed 'some help' to find 'a lot of cigars'. He wanted '1,000 Petit Upmanns' and needed them by 'tomorrow morning'. Salinger added: 'I walked out of the office wondering if I would succeed. But since I was a solid Cuban cigar smoker, I knew a lot of stores. I worked on the problem into the evening. 'The next morning, I walked into my White House office at about 8am, and the direct line from the President's office was already ringing. He asked me to come in immediately. 'How did you do Pierre?' he asked, as I walked through the door. 'Very well,' I answered. In fact, I'd gotten 1,200 cigars. Kennedy smiled, and opened up his desk. 'He took out a long paper which he immediately signed. It was the decree banning all Cuban products from the United States. Cuban cigars were now illegal in our country.'
They probably do coke, weed, meth, and crack these days.
Would not surprise me. There may even be some that use heroin. Si vis pacem, para bellum Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God. There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."Theodore Roosevelt-1907. I am concerned for the security of our great nation; not so much because of any threat from without, but because of the insidious forces working from within." -- General Douglas MacArthur
The re-surfacing of the story, initially recounted by Salinger to Cigar Aficionado magazine in 1992, comes with the passing of the 50th anniversary of the embargo yesterday.
#2. To: Deckard (#0)
#3. To: A K A Stone (#2)
" They probably do coke, weed, meth, and crack these days. "
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