The Culture War

    Over the last hundred years our nation has been fighting a culture war over issues as diverse as Sunday baseball, prohibition, abortion, same-sex marriage and the legalization of various drugs.  Before his death, William F. Buckley said: “The culture war has ended, and my side lost.”  The results of the 2012 election confirm Buckley’s statement. 

    Sunday baseball may be a quaint place to start, but it was a hot topic at the turn of the 19th century.  Sunday was and is the highest admissions (and by extension most profitable) day for any sport.  Yet when the New York Highlanders started play in 1901, they were unable to play Sunday games.  It took until 1918, and a name change to New York Yankees, for the team to play its first legal Sunday afternoon game.  It took until 1932 for all Major League Baseball cities to legalize Sunday baseball.

    Sunday baseball was outlawed, because of religion.  New York politicians felt it was better to side with Catholic Bishops than oppose God’s day of rest.  Proponents argued letting children watch the Yankees play on warm summers day was more productive than having them in pool halls on a Sunday afternoon.  Sunday sports are a world stable, with the only hold out being Wimbledon’s ban on playing on the first Sunday of the fortnight.

    America’s most interesting clash in the culture wars was prohibition.  From 1919 to 1933, Americans were unable to manufacture, sell or transport alcohol.  The temperance movement started in the 1870s, and won its greatest victory with passage of the 19th Amendment.  The Volstead Act, the congressional act enforced the 19th Amendment, did not prohibit the consumption of alcohol.  It also granted exemptions to the manufacturing and sale of alcohol for such diverse reasons as:  sacramental wine, religious services, medicinal alcohol, embalming alcohol and home-made spirits.  Furthermore, the act allowed the consumption of alcohol, which was purchased before the act took effect, at home or in private clubs. 

    These exemptions made a mockery of the law.  The Yale Club of New York stockpiled enough spirits to last 14 years.  Jews were allowed to buy 1 gallon of wine a year provided they had a form from their Rabbi.  The congregation of Jewish synagogue increased tenfold, and the names of such devote Rabbis as O’Brien and Johnson were seen on the form requesting the wine.  The sale of sacramental wine would increase by more than tenfold.  At the peak of prohibition, doctors wrote over 6 million prescriptions annually, for medical alcohol, allowing patients 3 pints of alcohol a month.

    Pauline Sabin, a wealthy Republican socialite, led the charge to repeal prohibition, because she said the law made America a nation of hypocrites and undermine the rule of law.  The open flaunting of the law combined with the mob related violence lead to repeal of the 19th Amendment with the 21st Amendment in 1933.  The Volstead Act was struck soon after.  In effect, it took 50 years to enact prohibition and 15 years to dismantle it. 

    In the 60s and 70s, drugs and reproductive rights took center stage in the culture war.  At the same time, the Supreme Court began finding penumbras in the Constitution designed to keep government out of our personal lives.  The court’s rulings ushered in a fifty years fight over what is government’s proper role in regulating reproductive services and private relationships.

    Now, the culture war is focused on gay marriage and recreational drug use.  Thirty states have constitution bans on same-sex marriage and roughly a dozen states have statutory bans.  Eleven states passed same-sex marriage bans during the 2004 elections.  In 2012 three states approved same-marriages, and Minnesota rejected a same-sex marriage ban meaning roughly ten states currently allow same-sex marriage.  Although twenty percent of the states is not a majority, the ever increasing number of states allowing same-sex marriages should concern social conservatives.

    In addition, Colorado and Washington became the first states to legalize the recreational use and sale of marijuana, while eighteen states and D.C. allow medical use of marijuana.  Of course what do you expect when the last three presidents have admitted to recreational drug use.
   
    The most troubling aspect of America’s changing social attitudes, to conservatives anyway, is that they are manifesting themselves via the ballot box and not through the dictates of unelected judges.  Conservatives, myself included, decry judges making law, because when judges make law from whole cloth, as they did in 1973, it causes undue social tension.  Social conservatives may not like Maine or Maryland passing pro-same-sex marriage laws, but they accept those results.  Americans accept, or at least tolerate, passage of same-sex marriage laws when such action is done at the ballot box (Maine) or through the legislature (New York).       

    Although I applaud people becoming involved and attempting to make constructive change, I must ask where does this end?  First, if same-sex marriages are allowed, then why not polygamist marriages?  Polygamist marriages have a stronger historical and religious basis than same-sex marriages, and lawsuits have been brought to force states to accept polygamist marriage.  Second, marijuana is a gateway drug which leads to the use of stronger drugs like cocaine or heroin.  In addition, the proceeds from some marijuana sales fund drug cartels and other gangster like operations which threaten the safety of law-abiding citizens.

    I make no pretense to know how all of this will be viewed in 100 years.  Will legalizing drugs generate 1930s style gangster wars, or will it curtail drug violence?  Will same-sex and polygamist marriages become common or will there continue to be a divide on a state by state basis?  Who knows?  I, however, am proud that these issues are being decided by the people and legislators of the individual states, and not being forced on us by judges or the federal government.  I do wonder though whether the fights over drug, reproductive services and same-sex marriage will look as quaint 100 years from now, as the fight over Sunday baseball looks today.