The Alcoholic Republic - An American Tradition

The Alcoholic Republic – An American Tradition

Book review by: Nabeel Fargo

The Alcoholic Republic – An American Tradition is a historic book that is mainly a study of American alcohol consumption in the early American republic in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Alcoholic Republic was written by W.J (William Joseph) Rorabaugh, American historian and associate Professor of history at the University of Washington, Seattle. The author examines in this book various aspects about alcohol consumption and its impact on the American society at large during the period between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In this book the author also frequently asks several interesting questions and provides many provocative answers that could be intriguing at times and at other times poignant.

The author divides the book in seven different chapters; every chapter focuses on several key aspects that took place in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries about alcohol and alcoholism in America, as well as its effects on the people and the society at large. The first chapter entitled “A Nation of Drunkards” the author focuses on the early nineteenth-century era where America was seen as a nation of drunkards. “It was not so much the use of alcohol that worried them - they all drank to some extent – as its excessive use“(Rorabaugh 5). The author here points out to us one main fact about alcoholism in America where Americans drank excessively due to the fact that alcohol was easily consumed and people from almost all classes could afford to buy a drink every day and get drunk, and that is why we see in the first chapter the excessive use of alcohol in America during the early nineteenth century.

The second chapter entitled “A good creature” the author takes us back to the eighteenth-century era where alcohol was viewed as a good creature, a creature from God due to the fact that Americans, like Englishmen and Europeans, commonly believed that alcohol or in particular (rum, gin, and brandy) were nutritious and healthful. In the second chapter of the book the author also points out to us that all social classes drank alcohol from lords to slaves, and in some cases alcohol was given to laborers by their masters as an incentive to work harder. The widespread use of alcohol in the eighteenth century was mainly because its price was very cheap and everyone from every class could afford to get drunk and in many cases people drank alcohol more than water. Although alcohol was commonly believed to be nutritious and healthful, small groups of people thought that it was actually not nutritious or healthful, the two main groups that first believed alcohol was neither nutritious nor healthful were the Quakers and the Methodists. The Quakers and the Methodists banned alcohol from their communities, and both of these religious groups discouraged its use in general. The author also points out the significant role of Benjamin Rush who was a physician living in Philadelphia who condemned distilled spirits and at first believed that alcohol use should be limited due to the fact that its excessive use causes many negative effects on the individual’s health. Later on after a few years of research, Benjamin rush found out that alcohol had absolutely no positive effects and he condemned its use in public, and after many years of sharing his views in public many people were affected by his view of alcohol and stopped drinking but that group of people was just a minority and the majority of the American society kept on its traditions and views of excessive drinking.

The third chapter entitled “the spirits of independence” the author expresses the same issue of drinking excessively and seeing that as a tradition in the society, also the availability of inexpensive distilled spirits in particular Whiskey dramatically increased in the early nineteenth century. In addition, the author also points out something very important in this chapter which was the technological improvements in distillation increased the output of distilled spirits and that many western settlers began to turn large quantities of surplus corn into cheap, abundant amounts of Whiskey.

The fourth chapter entitled “Whiskey feed” the author points out the importance of drinking alcohol or Whiskey in particular in the American society with food and how that became a dietary habit at large. The author also states that Whiskey was being used in everyday life and it became a necessity for many people who considered it as a primary thing to have in their diets in addition to the food. One of the many reasons why Whiskey was so widespread and was used by many is mainly because of the fact that it was cheap and easily consumed.

The fifth chapter entitled “The anxieties of their condition” the author brings up the issue of the increase of population in America, many aspects of the American life underwent alteration, and in many cases astonishing confusion. As the population increased many people were looking for lands and acreage, the increase of population leads many people to look for lands. In this chapter the author points out how some people felt anxious and wanted to relieve their anxieties by drinking, and many felt that since drinking is part of society then why not try it, and this is why they grew out of the anxieties of their condition.

The sixth chapter entitled “the pursuit of happiness” in this chapter the author points out to us that many were drinking in groups and just by participating in these groups people were seen as equal. The author goes further and says that drinking also gave those participants a feeling of independence and liberty at the same time. Drinking was also a matter of choice for many; many thought that it increased a man’s sense of autonomy. People drank everywhere; they even drank in elections where they voted for the candidate that supplied them with the biggest amounts of alcohol because that candidate was seen as someone who wanted to make all the people or the voters happy.

In conclusion, the author concludes the book with the last chapter entitled “Demon Rum” which sums up the book by expressing the huge drop or decrease in the consumption of alcohol and distilled spirits in the first third of eighteen hundreds. Many religious groups saw that drinking was really not nutritious and healthful but the significant decrease or drop during that period is still unclear because the author of this book does not even provide us with a clear answer due to the fact that it was also unclear to him and everyone else.