The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1885-12-24
PROHIBITION.
Some Earnest Words From Mrs. chapln
To the Editor Of the Register

| neaft upon SupJecC WHICH SeeluS 10 D'
giving car legislators great deal o
trouble, namely, the conflict between the
homes of the State and the saloons
Which shall go? is the real question a
issue. The saloon can only exist at the
expense of the home, and it is source
of amazement to many of US simple
minded women that any true Caroliniar
should hesitate for moment in making
the decision. Aud now ! know you have
already thought to yourself woman's
opinion is not worth much; for she is
an unknown quantity in this worlds
affairs, and has not arrived even OF the
political attitude Of the negro. Never
do you mind that: unseen forces are
often the most powerful, as the liquor
traffic will most assurediy fnd out.
One of the arguments used against
prohibition. l see, is the fear that "il
will destroy the Democratic party
What does that mean? Surely it canno,
mean that the Democratic party is the
champion of the saloon against the
homes of our State. Every throb OF my
heart revolts at such IN assertion.
The two Greek word, demos and
krateo, which means, literally, "the rule
of the people," are the two words from
which the word Democrat is formed.
The Prohibitionsts are only asking that
the people may be allowed to say by their
ballot whether or not interlopers (for not
one in ten are our own people) shall be
allowed to place pitfalls in the way OF
our boys. Is that not democrafic7 And
is it not directly contrary to the spirit of
true democracy for any body of men to
dare to prevent the sovereign people
from an expression of their opinion at
tie ballot box? Things are getting
strangely mixed and we are asking il
we are not an oligarcby instead of a
democracy.
Again, the whisky men oppose prohi.
bition because it does not prohibit"
they say. Isn't that funny? 1t reminds
nc of drummer l met in Tennessee a
few months ago. He was on the train
With his sample package of liquor. One
OF our distinguished temperance speakers
boarded the train and took a seat by him.
In the course of conversation be told the
lecturer he was in the liquor business,
and asked him his employment. II am
after the liquor business too," replied his
friend. Then he says, "you have found
out it has gone up" "Oh no." said my
friend, chat is all nonsense. prohibition
does not prohibit" He grew wrathy and
replied, "Oh, yes, that's the catechism
you have been ordered TO say, but you
know ii is a lie. | have not come across
three places where dare open my pack
in four days. And more than that, it
won't be four years before there will not
be- one drop sold south of Mason and
Dixon's line, for these hot headed South.
erners won't let the foreigners treat laws
they make with contempt, as they do in
Chicago and Cincinnati" You can i'm
aginc the denouement when he found he
had given himself away.
Jefferson, the founder of the Demo
cratic party, said "large cities are sores
on the body polilic," and it is the large
cities of our State that prevent the full
enforcement of the prohibitory laws.
Europe is an inverted bowl, and America
is the saucer in which it is placed. The
surplus pours over into this saucer, and
this element is always found in our cities.
Like the camel, they ask 10 put their
nose in out Of the cold, and once in, they
take possession, and too often rule and
ruin. Statistics tell US "ninetenths Of
the liquor sellers are foreigners" They
dictate terms in Chicago, and the old
commonwealth of Massachusetts has had
to come to the rescue of Boston. hope
South Carolina will take lesson in time
AMI legislate the traffic out of the State
before the trafickers legislate US out.
The State must save the cities. There is
no other way for it to be done.
Laws are made to protect the weak
against the strong" 1 wonder if our
legislators have forgotten the large silent
constituency Of women and children
who, like the Caryatides, have to bear
nearly all the poverty and disgrace of
the drink traffic. They are now enlarg.
ing our Penitentiary. 1t makes my heart
sick, for 1 am thinking of the poor,
distressed families of the men who will,
because of this ghastly traffic which is
untiringly legislated for and protected, be
shut up in this tomb for the living.
"They deserve it," you say. Do their
wives and little innocent children de.
serve the portion that crushes them TO
the earth? The sentence ought TO read:
The man to the Penitenliary, his family
to poverty, scorn, degradation, crime.
His young daughters thrust out, unpro.
tec:ed, upon the world, fall au easy prey
to sin, aud as we meet them in homes for
social outcasts, or, as l saw them only
two weeks ago in the Penitentiary, shut
in with murderers and felons, and had
young Southern girls, scarce women, tell
me with quivering lip, "there was but
one alternative, for father was in the
Penitcntiary, mother dead-it was either
starvation or the sin that has put Inc
here" Do you wonder that women, who
know these facts, will dare reproach,
criticism, anything to help their sex
No, YOU would wonder if we did not, and
we wonder that you do not spring to the
rescue.
But these friends Of the liquor traffic
in the Legislature say we need the money
for education aud public Improvements.
We would like to know, by the time you
spend 100000 of the liquor revenue in
building that Penitentiary, which the
liquor traffic makes necessary, and pay
the extra expense the saloon brings upon
the State, what will be left.
Drive The saloon out of the State, and
men, instead of being in the Penitentiary,
will be at home supporting their families
and educating their own children. What
man, with soul iu his body, wants his
children educated with the money
wrung from the drunkard's poor wife aud
starving children?
No nobler women live on earth than
your Southern women, and if you will
give them half chance, you will have
no loveler homes But you are selling
the right of way to our hearthstones, and
there is scarcely family in which the
insidious serpent may not be found
singing some loved one. We look year
after year for help but look in vain.
Dickens, in Nicholas Nickleby,"
makes barber refuse to shave a coal
hesver, and when in remonstrance the
coal.heaver reminds him that he shaved
baker the day before, he replied, eyes.
Bu: the line has to be drawn somewhere,
and | choose to draw it at bakers"
Our Senators and Legislators have
been legislating for the protection OF
"cooters and tarry-pins." We arc hop
a., -, I'LL ,ct RI ro az tho limo there hut