The Role Of Modernity In The 1920's

In America’s 1920’s there was a huge clash of beliefs and opinions. A new modern outlook had appeared and many peopled followed it. There were many conflicts between these new viewpoints like the famed, Scopes “Monkey” Trial and the 18th Amendment which prohibited the manufacture, sale, transport, import, or export of alcoholic beverages. The 1920’s was a decade of reform in almost every aspect of society; life was modernizing. Americans experienced a differentiating of opinions throughout the decade of the 1920's traditionally such as the Ku Klux Klan; however, modernity was more successful in its appeal to Americans in the 1920's and ultimately changed American values because of new technologies like washing machines and flashy, showy actions like jazz that lured
When many people still wanted a drink, they quietly rebelled and created saloons where people were able to go only if they had a passcode. These speakeasies were a modernist idea because they broke the law and sold alcohol. Where traditionalists thought that alcohol ruined the minds of many, modernists believed that alcohol was necessary in life. People also silently bootlegged; this meant that they would often carry alcoholic products in pouches on their legs but cover them up with larger jackets or just that they sold alcohol illegally. On of the less silent bootleggers was the criminal, Al Capone. By age 26, Al Capone managed a whole criminal empire in Chicago, which he controlled through the use of bribes and violence. From 1925 to 1931, Capone bootlegged whiskey from Canada, operated illegal breweries in Chicago, and ran a network of ten thousand speakeasies. In 1927, Al Capone was worth an estimated one hundred million dollars. Finally, flamboyant feats and stunts such as flagpole sitting ensnared many people with the net of modernism. Flagpole sitting was a publicity stunt to attract viewers to movie theaters. The most