71 - 27,581 WHITAKER, Francis Myron, 1929- A HISTORY OF THE OHIO WOMAN'S CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION, 1874-1920. The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1971 History, modern University Microfilms, A XEROX Company, Ann Arbor, Michigan 0 1971 Francis Myron Whitaker ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TOIS DISSERTATim HAS BEEN MICROFIWED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED A HISTORY OF THE OHIO WOMAN'S CHRISTIAN t e m p e r a n c e UNION, l87k - 1920 DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University BY Francis Myron Whitaker, B.A., M.A. ***** The Ohio State University 1971 Approved by Adviser Department of History VITA October 2, 1929 • • • Born - Boston, Massachusetts 1 9 5 1 ............ B.A. in Sociology, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts 195k-1955 ......... Teaching Assistant, Department of English, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1957-1959 ......... Graduate Assistant, Department of History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1959 ............. M*A. in History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1959-1962 . o . Research Associate, The Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio I96U-I966 ......... Instructor in History, Otterbein College, Westerville, Ohio 1967 to present . , Instructor in History, Marion Campus, The Ohio State University, Marion, Ohio ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page VITA ..................................................... ii Chapter I. BACKGROUND TO l873-l87b .......................... 1 n. THE WOMAN'S CRUSADE IN O H I O ..................... 128 III. FOUNDATION AND EARLY TEARS OF THE OHIO W.C.T.U. 191 IV. THE 0H3D CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT CAMPAIGN OF1883 . 269 V. DEVELOPMENTS UNDER HENRIETTA B. M O N R O E ........... 302 VI. DEVELOPMENTS UNDER ANNA W. C L A R K ................. 379 V H . SUCCESS UNDER OTHER AUSPICES..................... ii32 CONCLUSIONS .............................................Ii85 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................. 190 ill GHAPTHl I BACKGROUND Especially in the Twentieth Century, members of the Ohio Woman^3 Christian Temperance Union sometimes appeared tc belieTe that before the appearance of their organization the so-called Temperance Movement in America was without form and substance.^ Such is not the case. Oppo­ sition to the consumption of alcoholic beverages in America can be traced back to the colonial period. Maay of the Ohio WCTU*s favorite positions and arguments can in fact be traced back to this earliest op­ position. It was, for instance, stoutly maintained by the Ohio WCTU, especially in the earlier years of its organization, that the consump­ tion of alcoholic beverages was the chief barrier to the triumph of evangelical Christianity in America and the world.^ An almost identical position was taken by the famous New England divines. Increase and Cotton Mather, in announcing their opposition to the increasing consump­ tion of distilled liquors in the early Sixteen-Seventies.^ Again, the Ohio WCTU argued that the problem of poverty would be solved as soon as 1. Ohio Woman*s Christian Temperance Unlm. Thirty-Fifth Tear. Con­ vention Held at Akron, October 7-8-9, 1906, page ij. /Published minutes of annual conventions, which include annual reports, will hereafter be referred to as %WCTU Minutes (year)*!/ 2. OWCTU Minutes (188U), 19. See also minutes for 1906, page 11. 3. Herbert Asbury, The Great Illusioni An Informal History of Prohi- bitlon (Garden City, N.Y., 1950), page 2U. 2 "the masses* could be persuaded to stop drinking alcoholic beverages.^ Some such philanthropic motive seems to have been behind the attempt to prohibit the introduction of distilled liquors into the newly founded colony of Georgia in the Seven teen-Thirties. ^ It was a primary tenet of belief among WCTU women in Ohio that abstinence from alcoholic liquor was the badge of the true Christian: one woman even went so far as to state in l8pU that "temperance is Christianity and Christianity is tem­ perance.*^ A similar position was taken in the early Seventeen- Seventies by those followers of John Wesley in America who took serious­ ly their leader's statement that abstinence from buying, selling or drinking "spirituous liquors* could be taken as evidence of a genuine 7 desire for salvation. Finally, members of the Ohio WCTU seemed to e3q>ect, at least in the early years of the organization, that the whole society would be punished by a just God for its failure to deal ade- Q quately (according to their idea) with the liquor traffic. A similar prediction was made in the first printed attack on the consumption of alcoholic liquors which was published at Philadelphia by the Quaker, Anthony Bene set, in 177h.^ h. OWCTU Minutes (l88b), pages 20 and 30. 5. Asbury, og. o^., 21, 6. OWCTU Minutes (1893), 120. 7. Asbury, og. cit., 25. Rev. Henry Wheeler, Methodism and the Temper­ ance Reformation (Cincinnati. 1682), page 17. 8. See a speech to the i860 convention recorded in the second of two volumes of manuscript minutes in possession of the Ohio WCTU, page 272. /These minute books will be referred to hereaftei* as "Manuscript Min­ utes, volume I or II (year)".^ 9. Ernest H. Gherrington, % e Standard Encyclopedia of toe Alcohol Problem (Westerville, Ohio, 1^>28), volume I, p a ^ 5 2 5 ^ 3 This earliest opposition to beverage alcohol was, however, spo­ radic and unorganized. The organized Temperance Movement had to wait upon the work of the man whom one historian of the Movement calls the "instaurator" of the campaign against beverage alcohol: Benjamin Rush, M.D.^® Signer of the Declaration of Independence, physician general of the Continental Army, member of the Constitutional Ccuvention of 1787, friend or acquaintance of most of the leaders of the new nation. Rush was not a nonentity. According to the Cyclopedia of Temperance and Pro­ hibition, published near the end of the Nineteenth Century, he was the first "writer of respectable parts to make a studied attack upon the customs and prejudices of the day or to lay foundations for a distinct propaganda" against the regular consumption of distilled liquors.^^ Rush's pamphlet, "An Inquiry into the Effects of Ardent Spirits on the Human Body and Mind," was called by the Cyclopedia the first "extended, w ei^ t y and well-sustained argument of practical character against the use of strong drink" vdiich "laid out nearly all the fundamental lines of argument along which the present temperance movement is pressed. This work was considered so important by later opponents of "drink" that a special Centennial Temperance Conference was held at Philadelphia in 1885 to mark the one-hundredth anniversary of its publication.^^ 10, Daniel Dorchester, D.D., The Liquor Problem in All Ages (Cincin­ nati, l88h), page 170, 11, Cyclopedia of Temperance and Prohibition (New York, 1891), page 602. 12, Ibid, 13, Ibid. A more recent historian maintains that Rush's pamphlet "came out at least as early as 178k." J. C. Furnas, % e Life and Times of the Late Oemon Rum (New York, c 1965), page 37. h Rush's pamphlet appeared in the midst of lAiat most students agree was the period of the greatest and most general consumption of alcoholic liquors in all of American history.The offering and acceptance of distilled beverages played an even greater part in the social life of that day than the offering and acceptance of coffee does in our own.^^ Perhaps more important than its social uses, however, was the conviction held by the vast majority of Americans in the half century after the Revolution that beverage alcohol was "good for lAat alls you" or what m i ^ t all you. Steady consumption of distilled liquor was thought to be particularly necessary idien hard physical labor was performed Just as important was its supposed efficacy against the effects of ex­ treme cold.It was against these "customs and prejudices of the day" which maintained the supposed medicinal benefits of beverage alcohol that Rush launched his attack. He flatly denied that the consumption of "ardent spirits" was of any value in aiding heavy manual labor or in 1 R warding off the effects of either extreme heat or extreme cold. Not only was liquor unnecessary; it could be positively harmful, aggravating some diseases and causing others.The danger of addiction to "ardent spiritswas acute. Immoderate drinking of a mild punch could lead to a 111. August F. Fehlandt, A Century of Drink Reform in the United States, (Cincinnati, 190U), page 22; Asbury, Great Hiusion, 3. 15. Pumas, Demon Rum, 19-27. 16. Ibid., 22. 17. ttid., 2U. 18. Cyclopedia, 602, 19. Asbury, Great Illusion, 27. craving for increasingly strong doses of alcohol until the victim became an obvious of not notorious drunkard. Such an obvious condition was not, however, necessary to a manifestation of the harmful effects of beverage alcohol. Rush maintained that many individuals had suffered and died from its effects without ever having been noticeably intoxi­ cated in their lives.Nor were the hazards of distilled beverages limited to a person’s physical weU-bein^. Ltcluded ia his essay was a "Moral and Hiysical Thermometer of Intemperance" which purported to pre­ dict the exact type and degree of moral and economic degeneracy to which 22 each level of liquor consumption would inevitably lead. Yet Rush’s opposition to beverage alcohol was not absolute. Despite his warning against the dangers of spirituous liquors, he continued to prescribe them.23 Even though he denigrated its regular use against extremes of heat and cold, he still felt that a little "rum" might be useful in warding off fevers resulting from prolonged exposure to extreme cold as associated with dampness. A half pint poured into each boot might also be beneficial.2b por those already addicted to distilled beverages he recommended an immediate cessation of such indulgence and a strict self­ limitation to the infinitely less toxic fermented drinks: beer, wine, and cider.