The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1873-11-06
THE LIQUOR INTEREST.

49, Yen 90 oaTnesG as 1t Is fOrcible does
writer In ScrSbner's Monthly speak as fol.
lows of the liquor question. TRAMP. tramp.
tramp, the boys are marching: how many of
them? Sixty thousand /! Sixtv full regiments,
every man of which will before twelve
months snail rave completed their course, lie
o0Wn IN me grave of drunkard! Every
year during the past decade has witnessed
the same sacrifice; aud sixty regiments
stand behind this army ready to take It's
place. 1t isto be recruited from our children
and our children's children. TRAMP. tramp.
tramp"-the sounds come to us in the
echoes of the footsteps OF the army lust ex.
pired; tramp. tramp. tramp-the earth
shakes with the tread OF tho host now pass
ing; tramp. tramp, tramp, comes to us from
the camp of the recruits. great tide of
life flows resistlessly to lis death. What in
Gods name. are they fighting for? The
privilege of pleasing an appetite, or con-
forming to social usage, or filing sixty
thousand homes with shame and sorrow, OF
loading the public with the burden OF
pauperism, of crowdihg our prison houses
with eons. OF detracting from the produce
tive industries OF the country, of running
fortunes and breaking hopes, of breeding
disease and wretchedneSs, of destroying both
body and soul in hell before their time.
The prosperity of the liquor interest, COW.
ering every department OF 1t, dep .nds en-.
tirely on the maintenance of this army II
cannot live without it. It never did live
without it, So long as the liquor interest
maiLt aims it's present prosperous condition,
1t will cost America the sacrifice of 60, 600
men every year, The effect is inseparable
from the cause. The cost to the country
the liquor traffic is sum SO stupendous tina
any figures which we would dare to give
would convict US of triling. The amount
of life absolutely destroyed. the amount o.
industry sacrificed. the amount of bread
transformed into poison, the shame, the
unavailiug sorrow, the crime, the poverty,
the pauperism, the brutality, tn. wild waste
of vital and financial resources, make an
aggregate so vast-so incslculably vast, that
the only wonder is that the American people
do not rise as one man and declare that this
great curse shall exist no longer. Dilettante
conventions are held on the subject of peace
By men and women VIII" fnd it necessary to
fiddle to keep themselves awake. A hue
and-cry is raised about woman suffrage, az If
any wrong which may be involved In
woman's lack of The suffrage could be COM
pared to the wrongs attached TO he liquor
Interest
Does any sane woman doubt that women
are suffering thousand times more from rum
than tr0m any political disability?
The truth Is that their is no question before
the American people to-day that begins to
match in importance The temperance ques-
ton. The question OF American Slavery
was never anything but q baby by the side ot
this; but we prophesy that within ten years,
1t not within five, the whole country will be
awake to it,and divided upon 1t. The organi-
cations Of the liquor interest, the vast funds !,
at It's command, the universal feeling among
those whose business is pitted
against the national prosperity and
tue public morals-these are enough TO |
show that, upon one side of this
matter, at least. the present condition OF
things and the social and political questions
that lie in the immediate future are appre-
heuded. The liquor interest knows there is
to be great struggle, and is preparing to
meet it. People beth In this country and in
Great Britain are beginning to see the
enofmity OF this business-are beginning to
realize that Christian civilization is actually
poisoned at It's fountain and that there can /
be no publication of it until tue source of the
poison Is dried up.