Identity area
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Authorized form of name
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Description area
Dates of existence
History
The United Kingdom Alliance was founded in 1853 in Manchester to work for prohibition of alcohol in the UK. This occurred in a context of support for the type of law passed by General Neal Dow in Maine, USA, in 1846, prohibiting the sale of intoxicants.
It was initiated by Nathaniel Card (1805-1856), an Irish cotton manufacturer and member of the Society of Friends. He had also been a member of the Manchester and Salford Temperance Society since 1852, and was interested in what was coming to be known as the Maine Law. At a private meeting at Card's house on 20 July 1852, the National League for the Total and Legal Suppression of Intemperance was formed. Other members included Alderman William Hervey of Salford and Joseph Brotherton MP (Salford). At the third meeting of the League a Provisional Committee was formed, based in Manchester.
Their objectives were openly political, to form and enlighten public opinion nationally, believing that the self-denying and benevolent efforts of temperance societies would never be able to end the liquor trade while legalised temptation to drink and get drunk was permitted. They aimed for total and immediate legislative suppression of traffic in intoxicating beverages.
The name of the League was changed on 14 Feb 1853, to the UK Alliance for the Suppression of the Traffic in all Intoxicating Liquors, and Sir Walter C Trevelyan, became the first president in June the same year, with a General Council holding its first meeting on October.
A weekly newspaper Alliance News was begun in 1854, a journal of moral and social reform, and sold for one penny. Since 1980 it has been published as a bi-monthly magazine.
They were not a total abstinence society, and membership was open to teetotallers and drinkers alike, by 1858 membership had risen to 4500, and £3000 was raised by subscription for their work. Their chief public spokesman was Sir Wilfrid Lawson, MP (1829-1906).
In 1862, the London Union of Alliance members changed to the London Auxiliary of the Alliance, and appointed it's the first London agent, Rev John Hanson. The Alliance had occupied premised in Victoria St, London, until the decision was made to build a new headquarters. A site in Caxton St was purchased in 1937, the new building - Alliance House - being opened in 1938, at a cost of £75,000.
In 1942, the Alliance became a limited company, the UK Temperance Alliance Ltd. By the 1970s the main role of the Alliance was educational work and its interest had broadened to other areas of addiction besides alcohol (much of which is undertaken by the Institute of Alcohol Studies (IAS), a trading arm of the Alliance. In 2003, the UK Temperance Alliance was renamed the Alliance House Foundation.
National Temperance Federation (NTF) was reconstituted at its annual meeting in 1936, and declared its policy as the representation of every section of the temperance movement of approximately three million members of temperance organisations throughout the country.
National Commercial Temperance League (NCTL) was formed in the 1890s to appeal to the business and professional community in the economic and ethical field of thought. In 1953, it approached the UKA with a view to amalgamation.
National United Temperance Council (NUTC) was founded in July 1896 at a National Conference of County United Temperance Councils. The aim of both County and National UTCS was to consolidate support amongst various temperance organisations for temperance legislation and to promote the temperance movement in general.
Parliamentary Temperance Committee, consisting of members of parliament supporting temperance legislation was formed around 1906.
The Band of Hope was founded in 1847, with the aim of instructing boys and girls as to the properties of alcohol and the consequences of its consumption. Generally involving midweek meetings with music, slides, competitions and addresses on the importance of total abstinence. By 1855, there were so many local bands that a London Union was formed and in 1864, this was expanded to become the UK Band of Hope Union. By 1901 there were more than 28,000 societies with a total membership of more than 3.5 million children.
International Order of Good Templars (IOGT) was formed around 1852 in the United States of America, it spread to England around 1869, to Scotland and Ireland about 1970, and Wales 1871. Its object was to secure personal abstinence from the use of all intoxicating drinks as a beverage and the prohibition of the manufacture, importation and sale of intoxicating drink. Membership was achieved by signing a lifelong pledge of abstinence.