Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1884-06-12
Prohibition and Prohibition.

Bob Burdette says: !" Don't be q
faratic. Don't be a prohibitionist
lunatic. Just simply don't drink. All
the whiskey in America can't make
you drunk if you don't drink any Of
it." This is q spicy andpungent way
to put it, but we may uae the argu-
ments.ma adhominem without assuming
that our opponent is either a fanatic
or lunatic. We prefer to cay that
he is an enthusiast, an emotional
crusader, and led astray by over zeal
which Talleyrsnd considered theipro
vocation of much evil. The best az.
gument against the prohibition idea
is that it partakes Of the Puritan pro:
paganda, which begins at one form Of
repression but may embrace all forms
before it is done. As a general propo-
eition, there is no more reason why
man should be legislated out Of in
temperance in drinking than gluttony
in eating; and there are. no tyranta
under the sun equal to thoee whosit
in Judgment upon their fellow men
whose appetites and ideas differ from
their own. The pestilent Puritan in
termeddling in otherpeople's business,
under forms Of law, is at the root #
all the isms, and it has been the pro-
IlGc distnrber Of the whole Union. 1t
purposes to make war on the Nor
mons, but brides mp when Gov.
B.own unmasks the whole hypocrisy,
and bids the pur;fcation begin at
home. The probibitionists are we'll
meaning, but they are engaged in
movement that assails personal free
dom in vital point. Incorporate
use of wine, beer and alcoholic spirits
generally is great ain and CON-
fessed evil; but it should be reached
by the same methods that all like
sins or evils are reached. To compel
one man TO abstain from the moderate
use Of beer or wine, by legal enact.
ment, just because another man gets
drunk and "plays the devil" is ab
surd, unjust and foolish. The late
Doctor Ward, Of Baltimore, told Us
once that in his extensive practice,
more people deceased or killed them
selves by overfeeding tnan by over.
drinking. Many hysienic writer's
insist that it is the abuse Of the
stomach by improper food that leads
to drunkenness. Why should not the
retormers, therefore, go to the marrow
of this matter and begin by prohibit.
ing the cause of all the woe that so
dreadfully excites them? We well
remember that whel it was proposed
to institute inquiries aa 70 iheIqnnsa
tr. fRc and its results, the prohibition
ists voted down Senator Bayard's
amendment to include opium, NOR
phine, and other drugs that have
made such fearful progress in States
where liquor drinking had been made
fierce legal war upon. Sauce for the
goose was not sauce for the gander.
Why how easy is it to argue for
prohibitingalmostan anything ordinarily
lawful by cunningly proving the
abuse Of it. Upon that principle
Mrs. Stowe acted when writing " Un.
| Gle Toms Cabin" What calamitiea
befell the country i'll consequence the
world knows, and the end Of them is
not yet. The marriage relation could
be brought into odium by just such
| unfair treatment, and newspaper
scraps by the crate could be produced
to make out an abomination what is
really saving and wholesome, as
we'll as divine, institution. Why,
here is pamphlet on tea-drinking
that follows the prohibition method
and style of reasoning, The writer
says that tea is a medicine and
therefore should not be taken unless
prescribed by an honest doctor. An.
other argument is that Greece and
Rome became great without tea. The
writer declares that next to grief tea
is the worst thing for the teeth. Dys
pepsia, sick Headache, heart disease,
palsy, epilepsy, spasms, numbness in
the back of the head, fullness in the
chest, syncope, coldness in the back
of the head, vertigo, and "formica'
of the scalp" described as '.sensa-
ton as if ants were creeping in it, "
are some of it's results. Scrofula comes
from it too, not directly but by in
heritance. Children, whose grand
fathers and grandmothers were tea
drinkers, are poor and scrofulous.
Woret Of all, the writer says that
tea drinking leads to alcoholic drunk.
enness. We are also told that tea-drink
ing does more to demoralize church
wo K than anything else. We quote {:
Is it net passing strange that a
Christian community, which with
every possible exertion can scarcely
be aroused to give $299,oo0a q year
for the conversion of the world, will
spend forty times that sum for tea?
Is not the influence, then, Of tea