Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1880-10-15
CHATTER II-LocAL OPTION.

In his mad, wild and tame effort Super
| latively SOY he says: Local Option is the
thin edge of the wedge of which unqualified
Prohibition is the butt end" Now he must
mean total P,0lti6StioR, for when thing is
absolutely prohibited there can be no quail
tication about, and the term qualified must
refer to area and mean all over the country
or total. He then proceeds to argue against
the results Of the thin edge Of the wedge or
Local Option, and must necessarily condemn
the doings and results of the butt end, as
that surely according to all mechanical laws
consummates what the thin edge commences.
If Local Option is wrong then Prohibition
must be infinitely more So according to the
original onslaught. Yet, in the second effort
he says he is friend, or at least no enemy
to total Prohibition. leave you, my fellow
citizens to fill up the gaps and draw your
own conclusion.
1t is eminently Democratic to legislate for
our physical welfare We legislate against
rotten oysters, oleomargine, etc. then how
does it interfere with "those broad funda-
mental principles of Democracy" of which
he speaks, to legislate against that which a
man puts into the mouth to steal away the
brains.
He says that it is singular argument to
use in favor of law to say that 1t will be
CNhutu VI DiOhCi ! dCL1 any SuCil ullCRd-
ton, and assert that any man who says that
it will be breaking the law to buy whiskey
outside of Montgomery county after the pas
sage of the law either does not understand
the provisions of the law or he Ensembles.
The question before the people of the
county is license or no license to sell intoxi-
eating drinks, and If decided in the negative
what is there about it to prevent man from
buying pint or barrel in either Baltimore
or Washington and ] merely mentioned
the pint and huckster to show that the av-
enue of procurement is open to the poor man
as well as the rich. And just here l will en-
deavor TO teach the gentleman u little more
about Local Option, and that is that it never
proposed TO save or redeem the habitual
drunkard of long standing; these are wrecks
upon the sea of life which only the grace of
God can right up; but 1t proposes TO do
something for them, to remove temptation as
far away as possible.
The main object of Local Option is to pre-
vent the making of wrecks out of the young
craft around us--your boy and mine-so that
our local law will not sanction public temp
tation TO become drunkards; and it is for
the benefit OF this pure and innocent class
of the community that we as fathers should
ask our fellow citizens TO sanction this most
salutary enactment, and that father who re-
| fuses Is recrcant 10 his trust-tO MS Coun-
i try-his religion-his God.
The nearer the beginning that the devia-
ton from the right course Is, the farther are
matters put wrong. One-tenth of an inch
of error In the levelling of gun may throw
the bullet fifty yards from the mark. One
pace taken six inches longer or shorter than
the one before il will turn quite aside and
cause 10 lose his way on trackless moor and
enveloped in fog man who started in the
proper direction TO where he was going.
An alcoholic fog peryades the atmosphere,oi
Montgomery county, and Local Option asks
that II be dispelled so that our boys may not
take the fatal initial step in error, but that the
sunbeam that dries up temptation and the
pure air that strengthens the young physical
system may have full and free play around
their forms, that no longer the fearful raw
ages OF alcohol shall Stay our noblest and
best beloved, shall write with its polluted
finger "lallure" all over their brows and con-
sign them 10 neither hell. Awake, arouse,
ffeemen of Montgomery, and let the ides
of November usher IN u social, moral, =
religious reform, together with new era of
political prosperity, With malice toward
none, and wishing prosperity to all, ! am
very truly yours,
SILAs WRIGHT DAVIS.