The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1874-03-06
SOCIAL OsTRAOIsM FOR THE MAN
WHO DRINKS IMPOSSIBLE"

SOCIAL 0STRAOISM FOR THE MAN
WHO DRINKS IMPOSSIBLE"
Under this head Mr.. L. w. Ryan dis
coursed very savagely on the evening OF
January %, in Nonpareil Hall, put
thug the above unqualified assertion,
in our mouth-an assertion, by the
way, which is only half the truth as we
told it, consequently his thunder was
leveled at an argument of straw.
Possibly our readers will remember
that we published, somewhere about
that time, an essay from the prolific pen
of this gentleman, in which he de-
manded that women should at once and
forever ostracise all men who drink.
We took no issue with the gentleman
in the paper, for We thought the "bum-
combe" of such an idea wasn't worth
spilling ink over, but We did, upon the
evening that he read the essay, say in
reply, that under woman's present
political and pecuniary status it is not
possible for her to ostracise drinking men;
and he, not she, is the dictator concern
ing all social questions. We related a
circumstance with which many of our
hearers were familiar, wherein lady of
Portland once tried to ostracise her bru-
tai, drunken lord. The home, which
she had earned, principally by washing,
was not hers, but her legal owners, and
there being no Canada for fugitives'
wives to flee to on this continent, this
lady sought an humble tenement in the
city and hid herself from her prOtec-
tor %, who sought out her retreat, en-
tered il and remained there, and she
supported him until he died, not because
she was indifferent to drunkenness, but
because she couldn't help herself. We
argued that to demand of woman, bound
hand and foot as she Is, by the political
and consequent pecuniary subsection
of her present status, that she ostracise
the purse-holding, law-making half Of
humanity, was to demand of her an inn
possibility, as great as that exacted of
the Israelites when they were COM
manded by the Egyptians to make
bricks without straw; that were it pos
sible for women, unitedly, to make such
an attempt, one-half of the married
couples in the land would be at once
separated, and that, If women ever
were to oitracise the men who drink,
they must first be made pecuniarily in
dependent of such men, and this in
pendence could only come through
political rights.
To ask of young ladies, who have
never known by experience the bitter
woes Of drunkenness, to ostracise the
young gentlemen Of their acquaintance
is Ethiopian, since their mothers are in
no condition to set the example. II
men want the evils of intemperance
swept from the land, let them empower
the mothers of men with opportunity to
legislate, and then they will see that to
socially ostraeise the men who drink is
possible, while now it is impossible.
In conclusion, We respectfully sug-
gest to brother Ryan that argument is
not his forte. He makes accusations at
random, begs the question at issue, and
then flies of at tangent over his own
mistakes. And inasmuch as we pub
lished his former article, and the second
| is by no means fair exponent of, or
answer to our brief and very respectful
and conciliatory speech in Multnomah
Hall that called forth this second effort
of his pen, we think, with brother Gale
Of Olympia, who declined to print 1t,
that "the best thing he can do is to keep
out of argument with Sister Duniway on
the woman question, for he'll come out
second best every time"
However, if he will make an argu-
ment upon our hypothesis, as above
enunciated, and not upon one half of it,
which forms the caption of this edito-
rial, we will print for him with pleasure,
but we have no notion of allowing the
use of our columns for people to assail
what they misunderstood or rmisconstrue
concerning what our opinions and dec
larations are. To be explicit, we sug
gest that he preach his next sermon
from our whole text, which reads in
this wise: at is impossible for women
to socially ostracise the men who drink
until they are first made politically and
consequently pecuniarily equal with
them"