# The Church during the US Prohibition



## Pergamum (Sep 23, 2015)

I want to research how the church reacted to American Prohibition, making alcohol illegal.

Did any church leaders protest these laws? Did any churches serve wine at communion in defiance of this law? Did they consider it an unjust law or an indifferent matter?


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## Backwoods Presbyterian (Sep 23, 2015)

Churches were allowed by law to serve wine at the Lord's Table during Prohibition. 

According to session records I read a long time ago (at least in Clarksburg, WV) it was kept at the Sheriff's office and the clerk would go and get their share after putting in an application.


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## Pergamum (Sep 23, 2015)

Where did they buy it and did they need special licenses of exemption?


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## Edward (Sep 23, 2015)

From Straight Dope:

"In 1925, the Department of Research and Education of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ reported that "the withdrawal of wine on permit from bonded warehouses for sacramental purposes amounted in round figures to 2,139,000 gallons in the fiscal year 1922; 2,503,500 gallons in 1923; and 2,944,700 gallons in 1924. There is no way of knowing what the legitimate consumption of fermented sacramental wine is, but it is clear that the legitimate demand does not increase 800,000 gallons in two years." "
http://www.straightdope.com/columns...-church-use-for-altar-wine-during-prohibition

"The Federal Council of Churches supported prohibition and the 18th Amendment. In 1926 two of its officers reaffirmed that support in testimony before the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate. The following is taken from K. Austin Kerr, ed., The Politics of Moral Behavior: Prohibition and Drug Abuse (Reading: Addison Wesley, 1973)" More here:
https://prohibition.osu.edu/american-prohibition-1920/federal-council-churches 
(The Federal Council of Churches of Christ was a precursor organization to what is now the NCC.)


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## Edward (Sep 23, 2015)

See excerpts from Title II of the Volstead Act 
https://www.erowid.org/psychoactives/law/law_fed_volstead_act.shtml


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## yeutter (Sep 24, 2015)

Many years ago, I talked with an old Reformed pastor who had a congregation in Iowa during prohibition. He told me that he and a local Lutheran pastor would carpool quarterly to the State Capitol to purchase their wine. He would buy his two bottles of red wine. The Lutheran pastor he rode with would buy multiple cases of a better quality of wine.


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## earl40 (Sep 24, 2015)

yeutter said:


> Many years ago, I talked with an old Reformed pastor who had a congregation in Iowa during prohibition. He told me that he and a local Lutheran pastor would carpool quarterly to the State Capitol to purchase their wine. He would buy his two bottles of red wine. The Lutheran pastor he rode with would buy multiple cases of a better quality of wine.



Wine runners?


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