The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1884-11-20

Mr.. EDITOR We are soon to have an
election in our city to determine whether
or not the city shall license liquor sa-
looms, and / ask space for a few words to
my fellow citizens on this important sub.
ject.
All observant and right-thinking peo-
pie see and feel the evil that is being done
by the sale of liquor in these licensed
bar-rooms, and certainly large majority
of our best citizens would be glad to see
it stopped entirely. But some who ear
nestly desire to see this result brought
about are deferred from voting for mo
license" by the fact that they do not be.
lieve that the sale of, liquor can be stopped
by a prohibition vote. Arguing from
past experience they say that it is useless
to pass prohibition act which will fail
to secure prohibition. They maintain
that in spite of all the efforts of City
Council and friends of temperance, more
or less liquor will be sold, clandestinely
if not openly, and that therefore it is
useless and worse than useless to pass q
prohibitory act. AS to this let me say
two things:
Il. Less liquor will, be sold. Some per-
sons will continue to procure it, and some
will still get drunk. But some who now
procure it whenever they want it, will be
prevented from doing so, and as result
fewer will drink and fewer get drunk.
This will be great gain. If only one
fourth less liquor is sold and one-fourth
fewer men get drunk, we shall have less
ened by one:fourth the crime, the misery
and the degradation which follow from
drinking, and are consequent upon
drunkenness. Such result would be
incalculable gain-gain to the drinkers,
gain to their families, gain to our COM
munity, gain to everybody except the bar
keepers, the wholesale dealers and the
manufacturers. It would be loss only to
those who are fattening on the crime, the
distress, the ruin, of men women and
children. AS we learn the tricks Of those
who sell, we can, by more stringent laws
and closer watchfuiness lessen still more
the amount of liquor sold, and decrease
the amount of evil resulting therefron1.
In time, I believe we can make prohibi-
ton prohibit.
2. Another point will be gained by the
passage of prohibition Act which I
consider of far greater importance. We
shall make liquor-selling unlayfM; we
shall put it under the ban Of the law, and
we shall make the man who sells liquor,
behe saloon-keeper or druggist, taw-
breaker. That will be great point gained:
Whenever you can get thing condemned
by law, you bring the doer Of it, under
the condemnation of all law-loving and
law-abiding citizens. And this will be
true even of those citizens who may not
at first disapprove of the act, and who
may to certain extent be in sympathy
with the actor. For little while preju.
dice may blind good citizen, and SYM
.pathy may lead him to condone an offence
against the law, and even to defend it,
but sooner or later his better judgment
will come into play, and he will uphold
law and condemn law-breaking. He will
condemn an unlawful lct, not because he
considers it wrong in itself, but simply
and solely because it is unlawfall-becau
it violates the law Of the land. For ex-'
le-smoonshining as the unlicensed
making of whiskey is called, is, per Sc, no
more morally wrong than the licensed
making of-itis. Yet you;and I, my read
er, Notwithstanding any sympathy we
may have felt for special individuals. you
and do look on moonshiners as outlaws.
Why? Simply because they are doing
unlasgfully just what Others may do-iaw-
fully. e., distill liquor. That which
makes them criminals is that they are
doing it in violation of the laws. So will
W6 dll COilo, SldQudsAys w 1oon aPS.@ sAAS
saloon.keeper or druggist, who sells liquor
contrary to law. He will become in our
view All outlaw, as much SO as the moon
sinner, and for us to buy liquor from him
will soon seem to us participation in
lawlessness. Decent, respectable, law-lov-
ing people will, as soon as prejudice wears
away little, come to look on the pur-
chase of liquor from a loon-keeper or
druggist who is selling in violation of
law, in the same light as they now do on
its purchase from "moonshine" wagon.
My fellow citizens; though we may not
be able, all at once to stop the sale of
liquor in our city, let US at least make its
sale unlawful and those who sell it law
breakers. Let us put the condemnation
of the law upon the sale and sellers, and
thecondemnation ofthe whole community
will follow in time. If this accursed
traffic does still live in our midst, let us
at least make it hide itself and let us
brand it as LAwLEss.
T. P. BELL.