Spirit of the age. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1849-1865, 1853-10-19
High License system.

Among a portion of society there is a false
idea engendered and fastened-an idea which
is more mischievous in its tendency than any
other entertained in the minds of the people
for the determination of the evils arising from
the liquor trafic-and that is the high license
theory. The advocates of this system are
doubtless honest in their views, and their
policy is to place the license fees on such a
scale that only a respectable and wealthy
few can engage in the traffic, and thus break
up the low, immoral, three cent dens of cor
ruption.
Now we hold that the license system in all
its phases gives responsibility and q false
dignity to a popular and world scourging
vice, which should not be sanctioned by pop
ular will or protected by the egis of the law
that it is, from the beginning to the latest
date, a well devised system of legalized swim
dling-and to increase the license fee to the
grade contemplated by some good friends of
the Reform, SO as to place the business in the
hands of a privileged class taken from the
moral (?) portion of the community, is mere
ly making the Ubiquitous traffic more respec-
table in the eyes of the masses, and it natu-
rally follows that its fearful powers will be
augmented and its terrible consequences more
fatal, as it strikes its greedy roots deeper
and deeper in its fostering soil, winds and
interweaves its poisonous tendrils around
every ligament of society. Such a theory
Nna atioo IL ~ no rria1 ont xrO,lI 1or,EoIlr A,,,
loose upon the public, FLOODS of vice and i'm
morality where, at present, there flows bu
Insignificant rius and it would impart tol
cradle responsibility to the deformities of tn,
Liquor traffic, which is now daily losing tn
estimation of the public, and would, as a nat
ural consequence, work out its own e~verlast
ing destruction, if the entire prop Of the civi
law could be torn away at once and let j
stand forth upon its own merits. 1t woul
grow worse and worse-more and more in
tolerable and soon, very soon an i~ndignan
host of freemen would demand entire prohi
bitiOn of the traffic, and shout the downfall &
this mother Of countless denominations.
Secure anything short of an entire demo
lition of the traffic, and the enemies of tn
Reform will jeer and taunt you with you
failure and your own imbecility. Any othe
system or policy will be fraught with disaI
pointment, lost time, energies, hopes an
money. The advocates Of the Reform hav
been testing the utility of these halfway DO
icies for years, and behold the RESULT tt
ubiquitous traffic in a degraded, shattere
mortality and immortal souls, yet presen
the same unscathed front of brass and jeel
and defies the host who would reclaim IL
world from the thraldom andtyranny of drul
kennessl Why tamper with these old, e.
ploded theories ? They have been tried faitl
fully, and past experience proved them i
adequate to effect any permanent or eve
transitory good. Let them be abandone
and let christians of every name, patriot
freemen and citizens, rally en- masse aroun
the standard of PROHIBITION, and WELD I'll
sword of Truth and Justice for its speed
triumph. The principle Of Prohibition h;
stood a fiery test and proved its efficacy
is, to-day, the handspring that moves Il
temperance host to action-unfinching, u
dying AcTIoN-and it is the deathless waite
word of the essence-Me Spirit Of the Age