New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-02-26
IFor the Sunday Republican.
OUR NATIONAL CURSE.


sire to present to your readers a few Stats
tics gathered from reliable sources.
The Westminster Rcriec says: Drunk
enness is the curse Of England; curse so
great that it far eclipses every other calamity
under which We suffer. One hundred and
fifty Thousand w0rkmen go to bed drunk
every Saturday night in. London alone 1t
is impossible to exaggerate the evils Of
drunkenness"
What is true of England is also true Of
America. Our national curse is drunken
ness. Carefully compiled statistics show
that every year 10000 lives are destroyed
by incompetence in the United States; that
100000 men and women are yearly sent to
prison in consequence Of strong drink; 300.
OOO children are sent to the poorhouse; goo
murders are committed; 400 suicides; zoo, 900
orphan children are bequeathed to public
and private charities. Our national army
of drunkards musters Coz, 900 and if marched
In single file would measure. in length, half
the circumference of the globe.
These are but general statements. To
comprehend the extent of our national
rse-drunkenness-we must be more par
t,tI.lar.
iptemperance creates diseases, and has.
tens premature death. Mr. Nelson, a regis
trar OF England, has shown that the NOR
tality Of drunkards between twenty one and
thirty is five times greater than the rest
OF mankind at the same age. And from the
age Of thirty one to fifty is four times greater
than the rest Of mankind at the same aye.
Another writer says "that at the age of
twenty. when the general population has an
equal chance Of living forty-four years. that
OF the incorporate is but fifteen and half"
From careful tables prepared for a prom
inent London insurance company. it appears
that averaging the whole period of life
from fifteen to ninety years, thirty-twO in
temperate persons die to every ten Others"
During the great fever which ragged in Lon
don in 1879, the Incorporate were the first
and greatest victims. During the yellow
fever epidemics in this city all physicians
unite in testifying that the chance of re-
cOvery are in proportion as the patient has
led sober and virtuOus life.
As to the cholera, however much writer's
and theorists differ as to its cOntagiOn OF
nOn-cOntagiOn. on this point all agree that
incompetence predispOses to it. Wherever
it goes the incorporate are its first victims
Monsieur Huber said Of 2l60 persons whom
he saw die in twenty-One days i'll one town
in Russia: 1t is a most remarkable circum-
stance that persons given. to drinking have
80, 900 who died in Paris when cholera was
last there were in the habit of using strong
drink; and nine-tenths of all those who
persisted by the same malady in Poland
were Of like class. Throughout England,
Ireland and Scotland it was not known that
a single member of temperance society
died Of this disease during its ravages in
1882, while it is computed that fve-sixths of
all who persisted were taken from the ranks
of the incorporate, and in one or two vii
lagos in Scotland every drunkard had
fallen.
DIR. A. NJ. Adams, professor of medicine
in Glasgow, and one whose name ranks
high in the medical profession, in a letter
dated November 90, 1913, says:
II have found the use Of alcoholic drinks
to be tho most powerful predispOsing cause
of malignant cholera with which am &C
quainted. So stron; !. is my opinion on this
point that were one of the authorities and
had the power, l would placard every liquor
store in town with large bills containing
the words, Cholera sold here
In Montreal, of one thousand persons
who died Of this disease only two were
tcetOtalers.
The statistics of deaths doings by cholera
in our own land have been not less alarm
ing. In 1882, when this disease visited AL
bany, three hundred and sixty-six above
sixteen years of age died, all but four Of
whom were of the drinking classes. Messrs
Packer, Prentice & Co., of that city, en-
ployed at that time four hundred persons
all of whom were members of a temperance
society. But two died with cholera. In
New York city, in the same year. OF two
hundred and four cases in the Park
Hos only only six were temperate,
one hundred aud twenty-five of the
others died. "Facts abundantly authorize
the conclusion" said distinguished
physician who had given special attention
to the subject, THAT had it not been for the
sale and use of Spirits there had not been
cholera enough in the city of New York to
have caused the cessation Of business for
single day
In Albany while of the mem bers of tenn
perance societies only one in two thousand
five hundred died, Of the rest of the popu-
luton one III sixty died.
In New York city during 1882, of the five
thousand members of temperance societies,
only two died; of the Hibernian Temperance
Society not one died, and of the African
Temperance Society, Of one hundred and
ninety-twO members, not one died. These
facts and figures might be multiplied, but
these are enough from which to conclude
that incompetence creates diseases and
hastens premature death.
lntemperance leads to poverty and
Observation-Disclosures and national. DR..
Lees, of London, in speaking Of Ireland,
says: ireland has been poor nation from
want of capital and has wanted capital
chiefly because the people preferred
swallowing it to saving it, Again, 1.-THE
poor swallow their independence in swallow
ing their capital, and along with that,
swallow their moral attributes and
social influences whereby alone they
can rise to political power and
so cease to be the lower classes.
Liquor is the great leveler." In the year
1862 New York relieved 257.354 paupers,
seven-eighths of whom were reduced to
that low and depraved condition, directly
or indirectly, by intemperance.
incompetence is the parent Of more crime
than all other influences combined. Every
grogshOp is centre from which there con
stantly radiates almost every form of i'm
moral influence to curse society. Drunken
ness dethrOnes the reason and makes man
the willing instrument of passion. The late
eminent Judge Cady, of New York, who
died, being upward of eighty years old, de-
clared, in public assembly, that the
greater portion of the trials for murder and
assault and battery that were brought into
court, since his entrance on the practice of
law, originated in drunkenness"
In tho "Twentieth Annual Report
of tho Executive Committee of the
Prison Association Of New York"
We find the following humiliating facts
recorded:
There can be no doubt that, Of all
the prOximate sources of crime. the use
of Intoxicating liquors is the most prolific
and the mos. deadly. OF other causes it may
be said that they slay their thousands; Of
this it may be acknowledged that it Stays
it's tens Of Thousands"
The committee asked for the opinion of
the jail officers in nearly every county in the
State az to the proportion of commitments
due, either directly or indirectly, to strong