35. Opium Was Proposed as an Alternative to Alcohol
With much of the country sozzled all the time or just about, social reformers began calling for solutions to the scourge of widespread alcohol abuse. Thus was born the temperance movement. However, when the movement first began, “temperance” did not initially carry the same meaning that it eventually would, and still does today.
For example, Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush, a Declaration of Independence signer, a friend of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, and an early temperance advocate, sought to wean drinkers off the booze with an intermediate beverage. So he urged whiskey guzzlers to drink instead what he deemed to be a less harmful alternative: wine, mixed with opium and laudanum.