In the era after the American Revolution, many people began to drink in excess due to the economic and social problems. It was “often considered healthier to drink fermented and distilled beverages than water, which was often contaminated.” Due to the increase in drinking, the Temperance Movement began to solve this growing issue. Temperance was “primarily a religiously inflected campaign.” A group of evangelical Calvinist ministers in Massachusetts created pamphlets against the use of all alcohol.

This movement’s main goal was to “advocate for the total abstinence of all alcohol.”

Out of this goal formed a pledge, known as the Temperance Pledge.  At first, signing this pledge meant drinking in moderation and agreeing to pay fines when they broke the pledge. But as the movement grew the meaning changed to agreeing to sustain from drinking any alcohol. Many people saw this act of signing as “an effort to make himself or herself a better human being.” People who signed this pledge were then called “teetotalers” or an individual who never drinks alcohol.  This pledge was often signed in a public setting with many witnesses. In 1826, the American Temperance Society was founded. By 1833, 1.25 million people had taken the pledge. In the Diary, Hopper often references “the Pledge,” meaning the Temperance Pledge and by signing this, these individuals were agreeing to no longer drink and try to become better people in the eyes of Hopper.

Sources:

“A Temperance Pledge from Amherst College.”  Teach U.S. History. November 28, 2003. Accessed March 3, 2019. http://www.teachushistory.org/Temperance/forstudents.htm

Harding, Susan F. "American Protestant Moralism and the Secular Imagination: From Temperance to the Moral Majority." Social Research 76, no. 4 (2009): 1277-1306. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=47798143&site=ehost-live.