Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1877-06-16
A SENTENCE WORTH PIONEERING.

Three saloon keepers in Chicago
were found guilty of selling liquor to
minors. The address of the Justice
when they were sentenced, as re-
ported in the Chicago Tribune, is
original and eminently wholesome.
The evils of the liquor traffic, and
what a license involves, are rarely
set out in a clearer light than in the
following address by Judge Read
ing:
"By the law you may sell to men
and women, if they will buy. You
have given your bond, and paid
your license to sell to them and no
one has right to modest your legal
business. No matter what the con-
sequences may be, no matter what
poverty and destitutiOn are pro-
duced by your selling according to
law, you have paid your money for
this privilege, and you are licensed
to pursue your calling. No matter
what families are distracted and rem
dered miserable; no matter what
wives are treated with violence !;
what children starVe or mourn over
the edegradatiOn Ofa parent, your bus
mess is legaliZed, and no one may in
terfere with you in it. No matter
what mother may agOniZe over the
loss of a son, or sister blush at the
shame Of a brother, you have right
to disregard them all and pursue
your legal calling-yOu are licensed
You may fit up your lawful place of
business in the most enticing and
captivating form; you may furnish
it with the most costly and elegant
equipments for your lawful trade !;
you may fill it with the allurementS
of amusement; you may use all
your arts to induce visitors ; you may
Skillfully arrange and eXpOSet view
your choicest wines and most capti-
waiting beverages you may then in
duce thirst by all cOntrivances to
produce raging appetite for drink,
and thenyOu may supply theappetite
to the full, because it is lawful; you
have for it-yOu have a license.
"YOu may allow boys, almost
children to frequent your saloon ;
they may witness the apparent sat
isfaction with which their seniors
quaff the sparkling glass you may
be schooling and training them for
the period of tWenty-one, when
they, too, can participate, for all
this is lawful. You may hold the
cup to their very lips, but you must
not let them drink-that is unlaw-
full. But, while you have all these
privileges for money you pay, this
privilege of selling to children is
denied you. Here parents have the
right to say "Leave my son to me
until the law gives you right to
destroy him. Do not anticipated that
terrible moment when | can assert
for him no further rights of protec-
ton. That will be soon enough for
me, for his mother, for his sister, for
his friends and for the community to
see him take his road to death. Give
him to us in his childhood at least.
Let us have a few years of his youth,
in which we can enjoy his innocence,
to repay us in some degree for the
care and love we have lavished upon
him." This is something you who
now stand prisoners at the bar have
not paid for; this is not embraced
in your license.
"FOr this Offense, the court SEN
tences you to ten days imprisOn-
ment in the county Jail, and that you
pay a fine of seventy-five dollars
and costs; and that you stand COM
mitted until the fine and costs ofthis
prosecution are paid.