St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1884-04-08

Der of saloons usually exceeds that of all
kinds of provision stores combined. In New
York there are 9,075 licensed saloons; the
shops of butchers, bakers and grocers aggre-
gate 1871.
The temptation to drink is placed at
each mans door; wherever he goes it con-
fronts him. They are ignorant of the tend
encies Of human nature who dc not see that
thousand persons will drink when tempta-
ton presses upon them, for the hundred
who viii put themselves TO some difficulty to
seek out liquor. The temptation, moreover,
does not confine itself to its silent presence:
each saloon-keeper is impelled by his own in
terest to induce men to drink. The traffic is
in constant search of opportunities to gain
further expansion. The wholesale dealers
are the chief culprits. They set up the retail
ers, advancing money to pay the Ii
cense fee and the rent of the shop, and to
purchase fixtures. In Chicago, it has
been ascertained by reporter of the Tribune
that three wholesale dealers hold mortgages
ON the fixtures of 100 saloons, which their
money enabled the keepers to open. In Buff
falo. where saloon-keepers must furnish sure
ties, four wholesale dealers are sureties for
2S7 retailers.
The traffic is lawless in its thirst for gain,
and this expansion is in great measure the
cause 1t observes no law; it desecrates the
Sunday; it sells TO minors and to habitual
drunkards. In Chicago, where the license
law discriminating between whiskey ard beer
leaves an opening for fraud, the traffic openly
beasts that it will avail itself of. the opening.
One of the Brooklyn papers lately gave an
account of meeting Of liquor dealers, in
which after considerable debate they deliber-
ately refused to pass resolution to the effect
that their organization was formed to observe
the law, and not to defy it. The New York
saloon keepers have seriously offered in a
talk with the members of the legislature in
Albany, who are urging high license, to
observe henceforward the Sunday law if the
high license measure were withdrawn. The
lawlessness of the liquor traffic teaches law
lessness to the masses, and we need not Won
der that law no longer commands respect in
our cities, and that the mob is not seldom the
sovereign.
The expansion of the traffic impels it to
lawlessness. There are so many saloons that
if the business were carried on in due accor-
dance with the natural and the civil law,
saloon keepers would starve. Besides the
facilities for establishing saloon, through
the leniency of the state towards the traffic
and through the willingness of the wholesale
dealer to open new output for his beer or
whiskey, are such that broken down, impe-
cunious men, who are unfit for all else,
rush into the business. Men without honor
or character find saloon keeping an occupa-
ton congenial to their tastes and habits.
Nearly one-half of the saloon keepers of
New York and Philadelphia have at one
time or another been inmates of some jail.
This the liquor traffic of to-day; and this
liquor traffic, vuture-like, has seized upon
the commonwealth holds, it quivering in its
talons, and feasts upon its life blood. In
New York, Boston, Chicago, saloon keepers
occupy from one-third to one-half of the
aldermanic chairs in the municipal council
halls. In other places aldermen are at least
the creatures and the humble servants of the
saloon interest. The party ticket is usually
made up in the saloon the political farce
which we call the primaries decks it out with
some popular shibboleth and it is foisted
upon the country as the will of the people,
while it is the will only of the whisky and
beer element. Oh, liberty to what
vile slavery we have permitted
thee to be subjected We, the
people, are the guilty destroyers of civil lib
erty, by allowing the saloon to rule and to
ruin. We have fought and bled ON battle
fields we proclaim again our readiness to
fight and bleed for the honor and the life of
the republic, and when we behold her dis
graccd and enslaved by saloons and saloon
power, we fold our arms and stand by the OBJ
servers of her shame.
There is a remedy for the evil, and the
remedy is in our own hands. While it is yet
time, let us place the traffic under bond, and
bring it back by severe restriction as near
as possible to permissible limits. The m cas-
ure to be adopted is high license. High
license is the rallying cry of the friends of
law and order through Am erica, it is the
voice of the people.
There can be no doubt as to the equity of
the measure. If it is efficacious in suppress
ing great evil, it is certainly within the COM
potency of the state to put it in force. If it is
pcwerless to effect the direct object which
is proposed, at least will it do justice to the
country, in as much as it will compel the
traffic to pay into the public treasury sum
somewhat comm nsurate with the burdens it
imposes upon the sober and conservative
elements of the population.
The measure will succeed. 1t is plain that
large number Of saloons will not find it
profitable to pay a license of $500 or $1,000,
and will close their doors. Nor will the whole
sale dealers be as ready to set up impover-
ished men in the business as if the fee were
smaller sum. The liquor men confess that
a considerable reduction will follow. / re-
member, when in December, 1882, an effort
was made in st. Paul to raise the license, the
wholesale dealers complained that due notice
of the proposed reform had not been given
to them, great many saloon keepers being
then in their debt who would leave the bust
x,af 41.o,, Oh 4~oI
place. A few days ago Mr.. Adolph Nelson, of
New York, representing the liquor men ofhis
city, testified before committee of the AL
bany legislature, in opposition to the Roose-
welt high license bill that che had been en-
engaged in the liquor traffic ever since he
reached this country from Europe at six years
of age,''- this, he said, I suppose, to show
that the knew what he was talking about and
that the new bill would wipe out more than
half the saloons of the city" Facts prove
my statements. Four years ago with low
license Omaha had a population of 10000,
and $50 saloons; to-day with high license, it
has population of 80, 000and eighty saloons
Bloomington, Illinois, has with high license
population of 20, 900, and thirty-two saloons.
Joliet, Htin OILS, had 10 saloons under the $50
license; siXty-eight under $500 license, and
thirty-four under 81 900 license.
The reduction takes place where the need
is greatest. High license wipes out the gro
Gerry saloon, the pest of the laboring classes;
it drives out of business the impecunious fell
low whom his very poverty compels to be
reckless. The saloons on the suburbs of the
town among the residences of the working
men will be closed. The saloons that re-
main lest they lose the fee which has been
paid will be more careful not to violate the
laws, and will permit inside their doors no
disorder or rowdyism. The political power
of the traffic is reduced with the reduction of
the number ofits political agents, land Of their
hangers on. Police control over saloons is
possible, and the saloon keepers themselves,
for their own interest, will be efficient aids