St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1886-08-16
sA.pnEA FOR THE LAWS.
DIR. Dana Discourses Ola the Column
bia Society and the Law and Order

DIR. Dana DiscOurses Ola the Column
bia Society and the Law and Order
League.
The Rev. DR.. Dana yesterday preached
in Plymouth church sermon on the recent
action of the Columbia association and the
Law and Order league, before an unusually
large summer congregation. He spoke sub
stantially as follows:
The revival just now most needed in our
country is that of deeper popular regard
for law. There is abroad a growing impa-
tience both with the processes and restraints
of law. Glasses and Guilds claim for them
selves an independence which results in
license and under the name of liberty claim
rights which conflict with existing statutes
and the veal Of the community. The anar-
chist is only the extreme type of one who is
going to have his own, and opposed to things
as they are, propose to overthrow them by
violence And the typical saloon conductor
is one who defies the restrictions imposed by
civil ordinances, and undertakes to keep
open on all days, sell to whom he pleases and
to resent any interference with him when
thus doing. Now, law is no theory, but liv
ing force and embodieS the best sentiment
of every community. The statute book of
municipality and state represents what the
most thoughtful citizens believes should be
carried out. The duty of citizen as well as
officer is to see that all law is re-
SpSCtGu, dllu tudJ ISSpOCG Is SuOWu
in the enforcement of the same
THE NEW LIQUOR LEAGUE.
We have had this last week in our city any
thing but seemly spectacle. A company of
men banding together in an organization
whose practical purpose at least promises
to be an effort to nullify some of the oldest
and most essential of our civic ordinances
To this Columbian association falls the I'M
enviable notriety of calling in question our
Christian Sabbath, of challenging the city's
right to close the saloons on the Lords day,
or to enforce any of those necessary restric-
lions which every community has been
obliged to place about the liquor traffic.
do know no where else this right has been
challenged, but here at lasts an organization
reckless enough to do it, and regardless of
the Christian institutions and practices which
belong to every community in this land, pro-
pose now to secularize all days. and break
down all limitations to liquor selling. And
what has necessitated this new liquor league
with its war-to-the-knife-p program; its we'll
supplied treasury and its soon-to-
be dispatched emissares to every
town and village Of the state?
When this is clearly stated it will only excite
in thoughtful men a fresh adherence of a
business that thus perslstently reveals its
business 1t is too late in the nineteenth
century for the advocates and abettors of the
latter to resent the worldwide scorn in which
it is held or to assume the role Of prosecuted
and oppressed class. No Prohibitionists,
whom they delight to stigmatize as fanatics,
have interfered with them. No new ordi-
nances affecting them have been proposed or
enacted. A company of citizens of all call
ings and politics have simply united to form q
Law and Order league to enforce the
HABITUALLY DEFIED LAWS
now on the city's statute books to regulate
and restrict the traffic in Intoxicating bever-
ages. This organization is not political nor
religious it is not something new, for it may
be found in nearly every state and important
city; it has been conceded to fill useful and
needed part, and even by liquorsellers in
some cities, trying to conduct their business
legally, it has not been antagonized. All this
league undertakes is to enforce laws requir-
ing saloons to be closed on the Lords day
laws prohibiting the sale of liquors to minors
and to habituai drunkardS. That's all there is
to this Law and Order league, and the better
minded of our citizens said from the first as
has been said in a multitude of other places,
1t is a good and necessary thing, and deserves
support. So let it be known throughout the
Northwest that the liquor sellers in St. Pau
were reused to this movement because they
were opposed to having any laws regulative
OF their traffic and long on the statute boob
enforced. That's the basis of their recent
action, such practically is its intent and occa-
sion.
This new role in which the saloon men Of
the city appear will open the eyes of patriotic
men throughout our commonwealth. Brook
1ng no regulation. respecting not the sacred
ness OF the day hallowed by universal christen
dom, or those principles of humanity which
bid US care for the young and temptible, they
are now clearly before the people as obstrue