Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1886-11-05
that ono thing is to pulverize the rum
SELLING LIQUOR TO DRUNKARDs.
Y REV. ROBERT WHITE.

If it Is wrong to sell Intoxicating liquor
to drunkard, it must be wrong to do, or
to authorize another to do, that which will
make or tend to make man a drunkard.
It the result of certain course of con-
duct is sinful, the steps by which the evil
consequence was brought about must be
sinful likewise. But selling a man intoxi-
citing liquor to drink is what makes or
tends to make him drunkard. Then it is
wrong to sell or to empower by license or
taxation any one else to sell, as a beverage,
Intoxicating liquors.
1t would be very heinous offense to sell
man poison or pistol, if one knew he
was going to poison or shoot himself
or some other person or persons. When a
saloon keeper sells man intoxicating
liquor to drink, he does it with the knowl-
edge that, sooner or later, this man will be-
come either an habitual drinker or q con-
frmed drunkard. He can not plead ipnor-
ance. A very extended induction, cover
ing great many years and large number
OF cases, will justify this conclusion. The
probabilities are Overwhelmingly in its
favor. Then it must be very great wrong
to engage in the business Of selling, as a
beverage, intoxicating liquors, or to sane
| ton, their sale for this purpose.
| 1t it is wrong to sell Intoxicating liuuor
to drunkard, the question is pertinent
one, How did the man become drunkard?
! Did not the saloon keeper make him a
! drunkard? Thus the State permits q sa-
loon keeper to make man a drunkard,
and then, when the mischief is done, the
law steps in and says he must not sell him
any more liquor to drink. II this means
that no more Intoxicating liquors shall be
sold to this man until he has established a
reputation for sobriety, then we have here
most ingeniously constructed device, one
that would add honor to Satan himself, for
keeping up the supply of drunkards and
rendering their reformation difficult, if not
next to impossible.
| 1t, however, this injunction not to sell
Intoxicating liquor to drunkard is in
tended to be perpetual and absolute, then,
SO far as this man is concerned, provided
the law We're lived up to, it is prohibition,
pure and simple. But if prohibition is
such good thing for man after he has
become a drunkard, would it not be equally
good for him before? Is not prevention
better than cure? Would it not be much
more sensible course, by forbidding the
manufacture and sale as beverage, Of in
toxicating liquors, to render impossible the
manufacture of drunkards? Taxation or
license may reduce the number of places
where liquor is sold, but it has no ten
dency, as experience has demonstrated,
to diminish the quantity sold and drank,
and consequently is not adopted to nit
! lgate OF remove to any extent the evils
inseparably connected with the drink traffic
| But this prohibition to sell to drunkard
comes very far short of meeting the case.
By the time man has become q legal
drunkard he has acquired an almost ire
sistible appetite for intoxicants. Can the
law take away from the poor drunkard this
terrible craving for strong drink? If, as
| we know, it cannot then what farce and
a mockery to say that practically use
less) prohibition to sell him any more
liquor to drink, can repair the damage the
saloon keeper, by authority of law, has
already done the drunkard. How much
wiser and more consistent it would be to
forbid entirely the manufacture and sale,
as beverage, of all intoxicating liquors.
"Obsta principus," that is, stop it before it
begins. The only safe course for the indi-
vidual is total abstinence. The only reason
able and defensible policy for the State is
Prohibition.
Steubenville, Ohio.