The 21st Amendment, ratified in 1933, repealed the 18th Amendment and ended national Prohibition of alcohol. It is the only constitutional amendment that fully repeals another, and it came early in FDR's New Deal as a response to organized crime and lost tax revenue during the Depression.
The 21st Amendment, ratified in December 1933, repealed the 18th Amendment and ended national Prohibition. That makes it unique. It's the only amendment in the Constitution whose entire job is to cancel out another amendment.
By the early 1930s, Prohibition looked like a failed experiment. It hadn't stopped drinking; it had pushed alcohol underground, fueled organized crime (think bootlegging and speakeasies), and cost the federal government enormous tax revenue at the exact moment the Great Depression made every dollar count. Repeal fit the New Deal mood perfectly. Legalizing alcohol again meant new excise taxes, new jobs in brewing and distilling, and one less unenforceable law for the government to police. So while the 21st Amendment isn't a New Deal relief program, it reflects the same 1933 logic: the government adjusting policy to deal with the economic and social wreckage of the Depression.
This term lives in Unit 7 (Topic 7.10, The New Deal) and supports learning objective APUSH 7.10.A, which asks you to explain how the Great Depression and the New Deal impacted American political, social, and economic life over time. The 21st Amendment is a great piece of evidence for that objective because it shows the Depression changing policy beyond just relief programs. Repeal was part of the broader 1933 shift in which Roosevelt's government used federal power to stimulate recovery (KC-7.1.III.A), and it marks the end of a Progressive-Era moral reform that no longer matched American social or economic reality. For the Politics and Power theme, it's a clean example of public opinion and economic crisis reshaping the Constitution itself.
Keep studying APUSH Unit 7
18th Amendment (Unit 7)
The 18th Amendment (1919) banned the manufacture, sale, and transport of alcohol; the 21st Amendment erased it fourteen years later. Together they form a complete rise-and-fall arc of moral reform, which is exactly the kind of change-over-time story APUSH essays love.
Prohibition (Unit 7)
Prohibition is the era and policy; the 21st Amendment is its death certificate. The amendment matters because it's an official admission that the 'noble experiment' produced more organized crime than sobriety.
New Deal (Unit 7)
Repeal happened in 1933, the same year as the Banking Holiday and the First Hundred Days. It shared the New Deal's pragmatic goal of generating revenue and jobs, even though it wasn't an alphabet agency.
Volstead Act (Unit 7)
The Volstead Act was the enforcement law that gave the 18th Amendment teeth. Once the 21st Amendment passed, the Volstead Act became dead letter, a reminder that amendments need enabling legislation to actually work.
You won't get a question that just asks you to define the 21st Amendment. Instead, it shows up as evidence and context. Multiple-choice stems often pair an excerpt about Prohibition's failures (organized crime, lost revenue, unenforceability) with a question about why support for repeal grew during the Depression. The move you need to make is connecting repeal to the economic logic of 1933. No released FRQ has used the term verbatim, but it's strong outside evidence for essays on the New Deal's impact (APUSH 7.10.A), the decline of Progressive-Era moral reform, or continuity and change in federal power across the 1920s and 1930s. Saying 'the 21st Amendment repealed Prohibition in 1933, restoring tax revenue during the Depression' is a precise, dated piece of evidence that earns points.
Students mix up which amendment did what. The 18th Amendment (ratified 1919) STARTED Prohibition by banning alcohol; the 21st Amendment (ratified 1933) ENDED it by repealing the 18th. A quick memory trick: you have to be 21 to drink, and the 21st Amendment made drinking legal again. Also keep the Volstead Act separate. It was an ordinary law enforcing the 18th Amendment, not an amendment itself.
The 21st Amendment, ratified in 1933, repealed the 18th Amendment and ended national Prohibition of alcohol.
It is the only constitutional amendment that exists entirely to repeal another amendment.
Repeal was driven by Prohibition's failures, especially organized crime, widespread lawbreaking, and lost tax revenue during the Great Depression.
It passed in the same year as FDR's First Hundred Days and reflects the New Deal-era logic of using government policy to boost revenue and recovery (APUSH 7.10.A).
The 18th-to-21st Amendment arc is a ready-made change-over-time example showing how economic crisis killed a Progressive-Era moral reform.
It repealed the 18th Amendment in December 1933, ending national Prohibition and making the manufacture and sale of alcohol legal again under federal law.
Not technically. It was a constitutional amendment, not a New Deal program or agency. But it was ratified in 1933, FDR supported repeal, and it served the same Depression-era goals of raising tax revenue and creating jobs, so APUSH treats it as part of the New Deal moment in Topic 7.10.
The 18th Amendment (1919) banned alcohol and started Prohibition; the 21st Amendment (1933) repealed the 18th and ended it. Remember it this way: 21 is the legal drinking age, and the 21st Amendment made drinking legal again.
Prohibition was nearly impossible to enforce and fueled organized crime through bootlegging and speakeasies. Once the Great Depression hit, the government also badly needed the tax revenue and jobs that legal alcohol could provide, so repeal gained broad support.
No. The Volstead Act (1919) was the federal law that enforced the 18th Amendment's alcohol ban. The 21st Amendment is the constitutional amendment that repealed the 18th in 1933, which made the Volstead Act unenforceable.
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