At the turn of the century the temperance question ranked among the handful of public issues which dominated British politics. It aroused powerful pressure groups which insinuated themselves in the political process at every level from constituency to Cabinet. The politics of drink raises difficult questions about the effectiveness and style of these temperance and trade pressure groups, the internal dissension which sometimes dissipated their influence, and their relationship with political parties and factions at a time of uncertain allegiances and narrow pluralities. The temperance question worried the Conservatives intermittently, the Liberals incessantly. It strengthened the Liberty Party, strained it, and sometimes threatened to shatter it.Paradoxically at a time of decline in per capita consumption of alcohol, the temperance movement gathered impressive new support and the beleaguered drink trade achieved unprecedented political effectiveness. The dominant tradition in the temperance movement, that of the prohibitionist activists, was rooted in a hatred of drink as innately and infectiously evil, a force destructive of everything good, and in a Christian humanitarian concern for the security of the home. Many moderate reformers who did not look upon drink as sinful in itself or share the ideology of the teetotal home also worried about the effect of heavy drinking on the country.