The Jackson standard. [volume] (Jackson C.H., Ohio) 1847-1888, 1883-03-22
OLDEST PAPER In I
THE COUNTY. J
In. Y. observer.1
The Temperance Awakening.

not in our own country only, but il
felt in England and Scotland, ant
there is cloud at least the size OF
mans hand over the continent Of
Europe.
TIE hold the subject takes Of the
public mind of the country would sur.
prise us, did we not perceive the mag.
nitude and claims of the subject sc
clearly as to be filled with wonder
rather that any are Indifferent, rather
than that so many are awaking out Oh
sleep. And it is not the. least OF the
remarkable features Of the case, that
so many of the Western States are
making mighty efforts to arrest the
evil. In those vast agricultural re-
gions the power of reform is in the
hands of a different class of men from
that which dominates a State where
the voting majorities are in cities and
large towns. But city or country,
farms or factories, foreign or native
born, whatever the nature and char
acter of the people or their employ
ment, they must diminish the desc
lating influence of the use of intoxi-
eating drinks, or the drinks will be
the ruin of the country.
What is the reason that the very
mention Of the subject is distasteful,
not to say, disgusting, to a large num-
ber of good people. We have not a
doubt that hundreds who saw the
words at the head of this article turn
ed away to something else: and that
other hundreds have quit it before
they have read thus far. Why this
for subject which, next to
the revival of religion in the soul, is
the most urgent moral question in
the world? We have to admit that
the manner in which it has been dis
cussed by the friends Of temperance
has alienated many-that the parties
into which the camp is divided spent
in warning against each
other that should have been employed
on the enemy Of both. But it is SO
with religion itself to the shame of
the church. And all this time the
evil has been growing, until it now
assumes such vast proportions as to
appal the heart, and almost destroy
hope of success in making stand
against it.
In no State or town is the evil
greater than here in New York city.
We have a board of commissioners
who are authorized, on certain condi-
lions, to grant licenses to individuals
10 sell liquors. These men take the
ground that they are appointed to
license, not to restrain the sale.
the more persons they Ii
,ense the more faithfully they dis
charge their trust! This absurd but
fatal construction they put upon the
aw, and in proof Of their fidelity
hey point to more than 5000 licenses
now granted by them in this city!
To this number we may add at least
thousand unlicensed liquor saloons.
But take the legalized places only,
900, and that gives one saloon to
every 1873 persons in the city. Of
this number many must be minors to
whom they are not allowed to sell,
and women and men who never buy,
and when these are deducted, it will
be found that we have one liquor sa-
loon for every fifty or seventy-fve of
The drinking population! If these
saloons or hotels or shops take in
twenty dollars day, on an
average, they get fifty-four millions of
the peoples money every year! Such
figures appear incredible, but one can
verify them by simple use of multi
plication and division. And this
money comes mostly out of the wages
Of the poor. They work, earn and
drink. A poor man gets more OF what
he wants out of gallon of beer or
quart of whisky than he does out of
peck Of potatoes. He drinks to make
him feel better, and then to help him
to forget. The destruction of the
poor is their poverty. They destroy
themselves. And a vast proportion
of these fifty-four millions goes to
deaden the sensibilities Of the suffer-
ing, and to deepen the misery into
which they are sunk.
Let it be granted that things are
worse in such city, and tenfold
worse than in the country, east or
west, it is still emphatically true that
it is high time for every city, town,
village and community to hav. a
thorough temperance revival. The
press and the pulpit ought to te
heard, and with no doubtful sound of
the trumpet. With all the facts now
before the public mind, with the tes-
timony of courts and commissions
that three-fourths of taxes and crimes
are the immediate results OF the
liquor saloons, there is no pos
sible ground for doubt that the laws
of every State ought to restrain and
diminish, and as far as possible de-
stroy this evil, which is civil, political
and social as well as moral evil. The
law now encourages it in most OF the
States. But if the law licenses, it
may hedge the license with such con-
ditions as render the license hind
rance. 1t may render it hard to be
obtained. 1t may prohibit the license
altogether. The constitutionality of
such law has been abundantly sus-
tanned. The only question is the ex-
pediency of such laws. And if the
evil to be assuaged is civil and social
the expediency is to be determined by
the public sentiment Of the State
Unless that will uphold and enforce
the law, there is no good in having it
But the enlightened mind of the peo-
pie must be educated to the advan.
tage of such legislation as will helI
the poor to lives of sobriety, as will
save the families of the poor from th'
cruel sufferings now brought on then
by drunken husbands and fathers
and will convert the millions nov
worse than wasted into streams o
wealth to enrich and bless the people