Language of the Blues - Edmonton Blues Society

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We told him we had been to the Bahamas to see some girls and have a drink of some
good whiskey. I know he did not believe us but it was the best story we could think of.
They took the number of the boat, the name, and let us go. We had to tell our boss right
away, then we had to go to the spot where the people were waiting for us to come in to
tell them what happened. Those days it was understood that if we lost the load of
whiskey, they had to pay for it regardless. But on the next load, we would not charge
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The cost of enforcing Prohibition was initially estimated at six million dollars, but once
the Coast Guard had to begin patrolling the oceans at night for smugglers, the cost
skyrocketed. Smugglers bribed officials to look the other way, corrupting entire lawenforcement
agencies while Capone and other bootleggers used their Prohibition profits
to build organized and well-entrenched criminal empires. The cost of attempting to
enforce Prohibition spiraled out of control. Meanwhile, the government was losing some
$500 million annually in alcohol-related tax revenue.
In 1933, Congress caved in and passed the 21 st Amendment to repeal the 18 th
Amendment. To appease the more rabidly Prohibitionist states, however, Congress added
Section 2 of the 21 st Amendment, which mandated that:
The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United
States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof,
is hereby prohibited.
This put control of alcohol into the hands of the states, which over time ceded that power
to cities and counties. It is invoked to this day whenever officials are looking for an
excuse to yank the liquor licenses of unwelcome establishments.
Although people with money could get all the alcohol they wanted during Prohibition,
from 1920 to 1933 affordable booze was hard to come by for itinerant alcoholics, hence
the abuse of canned heat, and, as a very last resort, alcorub. As Tommy Johnson sang in
Crying canned heat Mama sure Lord killing me
Takes alcorub to take these canned heat blues
Tommy Johnson was just one of many musicians who have had their difficulties with
alcohol (and drugs). Bonnie Raitt recalled that when she took time off from college in the
early 1970s to go on the road with some artists that Dick Waterman managed, it was her
job to keep track of who was drinking what. Of Son House, for example, Raitt recalled,
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