Extract B suggests that large numbers of people were prepared to defy the prohibition law.

How far go you agree with this interpretation?

Extract B successfully suggests many people were willing to break the law regarding
prohibition, presenting it as doomed from the start as it states people ‘were prepared to defy
the prohibition law’, suggesting they would go to any means necessary to acquire alcohol.
Additionally it suggests many got away with it as citizens got used to seeing beer barrels
transported, the fact they were ‘used to it’ clearly highlighting how common the occurrence
was. The police’s incapability with prosecuting offenders and easy bribery also contributed to
this factor.

Source J supports this theory to some extent, as an inside account it presents how, in the
author’s particular neighbourhood, bootleggers were commonly seen. She states how they
would transport the alcohol in old grocery wagons and motor trucks, as suggested in Extract
B, however is also suggests that policemen were in fact a threat to bootleggers, stating they
possibly did enforce the prohibition law actively, as she recounts how drivers would carry
weapons, such as the mentioned shotgun wrapped in newspaper, to defend bootleggers
against policemen or hijackers.

Source I, on the other hand, mostly does not support Extract B. It presents how the
prohibition law, instead, had had a significantly positive impact on workers, who no longer
had ‘dulled minds, unsteady muscles and jumping nerves’ as a result of alcohol
consumption, which we know is true to some extent as the number of deaths by liver disease
decreased significantly. It does not mention whether this is due to men willingly giving up
alcohol, which would be the opposite of what Extract B suggests, or, the more likely
suggestion, due to successful law enforcement on the part of policemen and other
authorities, which would in any case contradict Extract B. Nethertheless, Source I completes
its statement by stating the ‘great mass’ of people adhered to the prohibition law and
remained sober presenting it as successful which does not support the initial statement,
additional differences can be found in the background of the two, as Extract B is from a 1997
presumed history book while the Source is a 1925 published essay from the point of view of
a businessman and therefore a limited perspective possibly written to promote tha law’s
alleged success.

Overall we can conclude that, though there were health benefits and a general improvement
in industries, the negatives ultimately outweighed the positives (as the ban was eventually
lifted in 1933). Bootleggers, gangsters and speakeasies ran rampant across the country and
policemen who actually enforced the law were too few to actually make much of a difference,
especially considering how easily they were bribed.