The Jackson standard. [volume] (Jackson C.H., Ohio) 1847-1888, 1879-01-23
RATES OF
WHOLE NO. 164S.
N. Y. Tr1bune.1
The Liquor Traffic.
To the Editor of The Tribune.

To the Editor of The Tribune.
SIR: We temperance men are all glad
that Mr.. Thurlow Weed seems disposed
to enter the temperance field as a worker,
but we are unwilling to let anything of
his pass which we think calculated to
undermine the only possible foundation
on which the temperance cause can be
built, to stand-that is, prohibition to
the liquor traffic. That policy is the re-
suit of the conviction that the drink
trade is in deadly hostility to every in
terest of the State and people, and there
fore ought to be put under the ban of the
law, like obscene books and pictures;
like brothels and gambling dens, which
latter are not thousandth part $50 mis-
chievous as the former to the peace, good
order and purity of society.
l know as much of Father Mathew and
OF his work as Mr.. Weed l have been
many times in Ireland, and all over it, in
every direction, and know we'll what the
effect was of Father Mathews teaching.
The drinking habits of almost the entire
nation were changed; millions of the
Irish people took the pledge, with SOL
emn resolve before God to live and die
by it; the grogshops were shut for want
OF custom; distilleries and breweries
were closed and silent; windows broken,
doors and shutters off their hinges, and
the roofs rotten and fallen in. How is it
now2 Breweries, distilleries, and grog-
shops more numerous and more flourish
ing than ever.
Where are the results of Father
Mathews great work "Gone where the
woodbine twineth;" vanished into thin
smoke. Why2 Because his plan did
not contemplate putting temptation out
of the way. Father Mathew did not
think of that, until it was too late, and
he bitterly lamented it to his dying day.
"Oh if 1 had only thought of it." he
said, when public opinion was all on
our side, to have obtained law to keep
closed the shops, distilleries and brewer
les whose doors were shut and whose
fires were extinguished, the results of our
labors would have been assured" But,
as it was, that really good, unselfsh and
devoted man lived to see the irresistible
temptations to drink and drunkenness
start once more into active life, and the
flood of intemperance pour in upon the
land once more and overflow it. And
to-day Father Mathews statue stands in
a small square in Cork, surrounded by
grog-shops on every hand.
Pray excuse me for saying that we old
temperance men perfectly we'll under
btduU why mf. w ecu SuOulQ ~ 6O
warmly for what is called the Murphy
Mr.. Weed has always been
sternly opposed to the suppression of the
by law, and his movement
has no quarrel with liquor sellers" it
affirms that "men have as much right to
sell rum as to sell -four" and declares
that "there are as good and noble-hearted
men saloon keepers as walk Gods green
earth" The old temperance men follow
John Wesley who said they were "poi-
soners general; Lord Chesterfield, who
said in the House of Lords in 1927, "they
are artists in human slaughter" old DR..
Beecher, who said: 81 defy any man to
prove that they are not murderers
Canon Farrar, who recently said in West
minister Abbey, "they degrade and beau
tify the people," Mr. Morrell, of Maine,
in the United States Senate, who said,
the liquor traffic is the gigantic crime of
and who, six months after,
spoken to about it said: "Yes, l stand
oy that"
We old temperance men believe all
hat, of the liquor traffic, and more; con-
we hrve quarrel with it to
he bitter end and to the death. A war
are against intemperance that does not
include the liquor traffic is as absurd as
% go into battle with blank cartridges,
lgainst a bold, powerful. unscrupulous
'nemy with shotted guns.
NEAL DOW.
PORTLAND, MAINE, Dec. 80, 1878.