Prohibition in the United States December 18, 1918. Upon being approved by a 36th state on January 16, 1919, the amendment was ratified as a part of the Constitution. By the terms of the amendment, the country went dry one year later, on January 17, 1920. On October 28, 1919, Congress passed the Volstead Act, the popular name for the National Prohibition Act, over President Woodrow Wilson's veto. The act established the legal definition of intoxicating liquors as well as penalties for producing them. Although the Volstead Act prohibited the sale of alcohol, the federal government lacked resources to enforce it. Prohibition was successful in
Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution its ratification. That clause of the amendment was challenged, with the case reaching the US Supreme Court. It upheld the constitutionality of such a deadline in "Dillon v. Gloss" (1921). The Supreme Court also upheld the ratification by the Ohio legislature in "Hawke v. Smith" (1920), despite a petition requiring that the matter go to ballot. This was not the only controversy around the amendment. The phrase "intoxicating liquor" would not logically have included beer and wine (as they are not distilled), and their inclusion in the prohibition came as a surprise to the general public, as well as wine