[Jolly Amaranto]

My understanding is that before WWI it was more or less condoned throughout the US. Many a city had their "Red Light" district. When the mass of soldiers showing up for boot camps all over the country started contracting STDs at an alarming rate the military leaders decide to shut them all down. You know, a war emergency, so they got away with it. This added to the general atmosphere in the country of a moral crusade against all vices, be they booze, drugs whatever. Booze was eventually allowed again but much of the other banned stuff never came back.