information:highlighting, structural:scholar_edition
Politics 1860s–1920s

The Midwest was a battleground for political and economic issues after the Civil War, with voters splitting along ethnic and religious lines rather than class. The temperance, Greenback, and populist movements gained attention in the region, with pietists supporting the Republicans and ritualists backing the Democrats. Prohibition was a major issue in the Midwest, with both the Women's Christian Temperance Union and the Anti-Saloon League originating in the region. The 18th Amendment was ratified by most Midwestern state legislatures, but the Midwest also became a center of resistance to Prohibition, with ethnic, urban Catholic and German Lutheran voters supporting repeal while native-born, rural pietistic Protestant Midwesterners opposed it.