In 1929 the stock market crashed and sent the nation spinning into a major depression. Over the next few years, businesses and banks across the nation closed and sent unemployment to unprecedented heights. The wet propagandists used the economic troubles as a focal point of their repeal. Wets blamed Prohibition for making the depression worse. They claimed it took away badly needed jobs and deprived the government of revenue that could have been gotten from taxes on liquor. They also blamed Prohibition for exacerbating the farm crisis. Shutting down the liquor industry deprived farmers, who sold grain supplies such as hops and barley, of their market. As the depression worsened and breadlines got longer, President Herbert Hoover's inadequate relief measures just added to the nation's growing frustration with Prohibition. Combined with wet propaganda, it made repeal an important—although secondary— issue in...