Barbour County index., 1882-06-15

During the past twenty years have
frequently discussed the varying as
poets of the Temperance Reform. Like |
every other moral movement, it has It's
ebb and flow, its high tides and low
tides; and these fluctuations are more
marked in this country than in Great
Britain, because the Americans are
more impulsive than the Auglicans
aud are not as thorough, systematic,
and persistent in their organized phl-
lanthropies. We go too much by spurts.
They excel us in The long and strong
pull.
Within a twelve month there has
been considerable discussion in these
columns in regard TO the success OF
failure of prOhibitory laws. My OBJ
servation has been that the success OF
every effort to suppress tippling-houses
by law depends entirely upon the pub
lie sentiment of the special locality.
In their practical workings there is
very little difference between what is
called "entire prohibition" and what is
known as "lOcal option" In Maine
and Vermont stringent prohib!tOry
laws exist. Those laws are enforced
in every city, village or rural district
where there is temperance sentiment
strong enough to elect magistrates who
will put the laws into execution. Wher-
ever the friends of order and morality
fall asleep, the enemy steals a march
on them, elects weak-backed magis.
trates, and righteous law is
practically nulliied. In the state
of New York a system of To-
Cal options is in virtual practice
very widely. Wherever local officers
are elected who are in favor of licens-
ing drinking-houses the destructive
traffic goes on unhindered. Where
there is virtue enough to choose boards
of excise who will refuse licenses, the
liquor traffic is Outlawed. In many
townships Of New York there is at
present practical prohibition of dram
selling and not single open dram
shop is visible. Names are but shad-
oTs. What is most to be desired is
the substantial extinction of the grOg-
shop, whether it be under a nominal
statute of prohibition or a nominal Ii
cense law. At the late election in
Lockport, the anti license candidates
were successful by narrow majority
now it remains to be seen whether
there is virtue and vigilance enough in
Lockport to sustain their new magis-
trates in their at empts to put all the
dram-dens under the ban. In Oberlin,
Ohio, righteous public sentiment has
exterminated the etippling-hOuses. The
real reason why all attempts to exter-
inmate or even to seriously restrict tie
tippling- houses in New York city has
uniformly failed is just this: An i'm.
mense majority OF the population of
that huge city is in favor of selling
and using intOxicants. If there were
as over whelming q majority in favor of
practical larceny then all the police in
the city would be unable to protect the
pocket books of those who carry such
useful commodities.
No stream rises higher than its
fountain. The vital point at which
sound temperance principles are to be
applied is the conscience of the indi-
vidual. Righteous laws against the
drink traffic are eminently desirable.
When sustained by powerful public
sentiment, they produce admirable re-
suits; but no civil enactment will
prevent man from becoming drunk
ard if he is fool enough to tamper
with Intoxicating drinks. Alike in
prohibitOry Maine and in free-rum New
York city there is only one absolute
safeguard, and that is the practice of
abstinence from alcoholic beverages.
The first text of the first Temperance
addresses delivered by DR.. Justin Ed
wards, fifty years ago, was this: "The
person who never drinks liquors can
never become a drnnkard" A half
century Of scientific discussions. of
legal experiments, and of religious eff
forts has ntVer carried us one inch
beyond that original corner stone prin-
ciple. To-day the temperance reform
is advanced exactly in proportion to
the progress that is made in inducing
individual consciences To let the intoxi-
eating glass alone. Even in heroic
Kansas, where our friends. are making
such noble efforts to exterminate the
drink curse. there will be no perma.
nent success if they rely on civil law
alone and discard personal and moral
suasions. The defiance of prohibition
in such communities as Leavenworth
and Topeka proves that already.
An article has lately appeared in
these columns from the pen of that
most excellent and able man, Bishor
Huntington, in which the establish.
ment of superior grade of inebriate
asylums is recommended, as the
panacea for intemperance. The fata
> difficulty with the good bishops plar
/ is that it works entirely at the wrone
, end. Instead of aiming TO save men
especially the young. from becoming
, inebriates, it directs its efforts entirely
toward the desperate enterprise OF
rescuing those who are already sots
Instead of buoying the channel, tx
warn every one from the rocks of ruiz
las we teetotalars are trying to dol. b,