The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1885-06-12
PROHIBITION.
The Women's Temperance Move
ment as q Factor in Politics.
Political Prohibition q Failure Except "a
an Aid to the Democratic Party
An Interesting Article by
Gail Hamilton.

/
| An Interesting Article by
| Gail Hamilton.
In the June number of the North
american ReUiew Gail Hamilton writes
incisively upon the Temperance qnes-
ton and the attempts heretofore made
| to take it out of the domain of morals
and put it into the domain of politics.
As guide to action in the future she
considers at some length whether the
methods of the Prohibition party are
better than those of the old parties,
whether its aims are higher and wheth-
er its accomplishments are greater. She
says:
The avowed object of the Prohibition
party was to supply the defects of the
old parties. The Pittsburgh Conven-
ton was postponed until the other con.
ventions had been held, for the ex-
pressed purpose of giving the dominant
parties an opportunity to stand by
the cause of Home Uersus Saloon
The opportunity seems, indeed. to
have been offered more coyly than it
was accepted. The Prohibition messen-
gers were invited to speak tefOre the
Greenback Convention, and were as
sured of courteous hearing in the
Democratic Committee, but, says Miss
Willard, with sudden and surprising
access of timidity: 1--WE had no heart
to avail ourselves of the opportunity,
after asking the Republicans in vain.
1t looks little as if the delegation
feared that the accommodating Green
hackers and Democrats might nail the
Prohibition plank into their platform
out of hand, and leave the new-party
people without board to stand on.
But the wise, womanly flies buzzed
away from that pretty little parlor, in
spite OF the courteous" assurances of
the willy, flattering Democratic spider.
Major Burke, and set up party of
their own. Its object was most
winsome. Women" said President
Willard. in her annual address at St.
Louis, in the autumn of 1884, women
will come into politics and cleanse that
Stygian pool as the waters of
Marah were cleansed." | have
never heard that the waters OF
Marah were cleansed, or that the
Stygian pool needed cleansing-if it
were not a river, to begin with. The
Augean stable was probably in the elo-
quent speakers mind, but as that
building has been rather overused of
late, it might have been temporarily
closed for repairs, thus, as it We're,
forcing the convention to take to the
water. At any rate, said Miss Willard,
10
place she enters" The object of the
union is, in one comprehensive phrase,
with Miss Wizards own italics, ..to
make the WhOle worid HOME-LIKE."
Yes, but there are homes and homes.
BY what methods was this home-like-
ness advanced? The debates at the 81.
Louis meeting were, indeed one might
almost say. caressing The speakers
used, not the rough words of the Chi
cago conventions, but the endearing
language of the home circle. The
audience were addressed rs Sisters"
and even rs ''Dear Sisters" When there
was apprehension of trouble. the lead
ers wanted miss Willard to tell us how
we can get sweetly out Of it, zone
of Iowas loveliest women, sweet
So-and-sO, came gently forward. and
taking my hand in hers certainly
set good example to the "rowdy''
male West. Miss Willard herself re-
ceived "such baptism of the spirit of
love and the love of my beloved sisters
that can not find words to express to
you my deep sense of appreciation.
Another speaker said she had felt the
tender pressure of yOCr kisses on my
LIP, and your arms about me-"
This is making it very home-like in
deed, almost too homa-like. Undenia-
bly, they did not fondle thus at the I'M
regenerate old-party conventions. But
this was before the election, and al
ready Miss Willard was sweetly COM
forting her comrades that 1.-THE 4th of
November is not far of. and at its close
the CALLING cross-fire of harsh criticism
will suddenly cease" The 4th of
November is a good deal farther off now
than it was then. and the CALLING cross
fire has rather decpened into an old
fashioned partisan cannonade, in the
thick of which Miss Willard and her
candidate may be seen fighting for dear
life. Instead OF settling down after
election ito that manifest DESTINY of
quiet routine work" which was prophe-
Sled, they are obliged to defend
themselves against the charges
Of indignant Prohibitionist, who
did not wish to be led over to the De-
mOcracy by any saint of the Old Tesla
ment or the New. Scarcely Were the
PrOhib:tionists outside the all-embrac-
ing atmosphere of st. Louis. when the
''dear sisters with their Quaker guns
suddenly disappeared, and men and
women alike went ut hearty and WELL
delivered tisticuffs. Mrs. Carse. Presi-
dent of the Board. charges that critics
Of the w. Z. I. U. are cowardly and
false; that ..Iowa's most noble woman"
Mrs. Foster, HIS been writing letters to
the secular and rel giOus press in q vain
endeavOr to disrupt the union: those
who did not approve the St. Louis ae-
ton are no longer ''dear s'sters,' but
"a few dissatisfied individuals. who
shave deserted the ranks" and whose
action against the Union is ''envy or
SANDER" The President of another
union in turn eharaeterizeS this charge
OF Mrs. Carse's as malicious attack
upon true and noble woman and
declares that, contrary to Mrs. Carse's
assurance, there are few unions in
which the harmony is not more or less
broken;" that the action of the st. LOuis
Convention indicates willingness to
sacrifice the cause to political aema-
gogues to build up a political party"
that Mrs. Foster is steadily trying to
reetify the mistake and to re-eSlabish
harmony. OF the w. c. T. L. Conyen-
ton she speaks in most man-Eke fash
ion. as the innocent, uns,lspecsing