Arthur R. Gould - Anti-Prohibition Republican

Anti-Prohibition Republican

Although the US was experiencing Prohibition in the 1920s, and Maine had the nation's oldest prohibition law, and the Republican Party was the main proponent of prohibition, Gould did not believe in it and both made and consumed alcohol at home. He created a minor scandal in 1929 when a testimonial he had written in 1927, revealing that he fermented fruit juice for personal consumption, was made public. Gould had written that "I come from a prohibition state and am supposed to be a prohibitionist, but I am about as loyal to the prohibition element as some Southern Democrats are to the Democratic Party". Maine's temperance proponents declared they'd work to unseat Gould, but he stated soon after that he wouldn't run for a second term, while denying the prohibitionist threat entered into his decision. In making that announcement Gould referred to prohibition as "this rotten farce".