Weekly Historical Highlights (October 28 through November 2)
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October 28, 1919
On this date, the 66th Congress (1919–1921) overrode President Woodrow Wilson’s veto of the National Prohibition Act. Known as the Volstead Act, after Judiciary Chairman Andrew Volstead of Minnesota, this law was introduced by the House to implement the Prohibition Amendment by defining the process and procedures for banning alcoholic beverages, as well as their production and distribution. When Volstead introduced the law on May 28, 1919, Democrats countered with what would be known as the “wet law,” or repeal of the Wartime Prohibition. The battle between the “wets” and the “bone-drys,” as Prohibition supporters were known, ensued that summer in the House. In one debate, Chairman Volstead defended the act, stating “The American people have said that they do not want any liquor sold, and they have said it emphatically by passing almost unanimously the constitutional amendment.” With a Republican majority in the House, the law passed the chamber convincingly, 225 to 59. The Volstead Act remained in effect until the passage of the 21st Amendment, which repealed Prohibition in 1933.
October 30, 2005
On this date, civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks was honored in the U.S. Capitol. In 1955, Parks, an African-American seamstress, galvanized the U.S. civil rights movement by performing an act of civil disobedience in refusing to yield her seat to a white man and move to the back of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Shortly after her death, she became the first woman and the second black American to lie in honor in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. With bipartisan support, the resolution to honor the civil rights icon passed easily. Public viewings of the casket were held on October 30th and 31st. President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush, District of Columbia Mayor Anthony Williams, Members of the House and Senate, and the Parks family attended an October 31st memorial. Reminiscing about her life, Parks once remarked, “I am leaving this legacy to all of you . . . to bring peace, justice, equality, love and a fulfillment of what our lives should be. Without vision, the people will perish, and without courage and inspiration, dreams will die—the dream of freedom and peace.”
November 2, 1983
On this date President Ronald W. Reagan signed into law a bill to create a national holiday to honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Managed by Representative Katie Hall of Indiana, chairwoman of the Post Office and Civil Service’s Subcommittee on Census and Population, the legislation passed the House on August 2, 1983, by a vote of 338 to 90. Since the King assassination in 1968, similar measures had been introduced annually, but all had failed. The primary argument against the bill, by fiscal conservatives, was the large cost of the holiday to the federal government, estimated at $18 million in overtime pay and lost work time. Hall courted detractors by moving the holiday from a fixed date—King’s January 15 birthday—to the third Monday of January to prevent government offices from opening twice in one week, thereby saving money. In the floor debate, Hall reminded her colleagues that “the legislation before us will act as a national commitment to Dr. King’s vision and determination for an ideal America, which he spoke of the night before his death, where equality will always prevail.”
