The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1886-05-27

| President, Mrs. w. Ii. Peasants, Richmond.
| Corresponding Secretary. Miss Loua A. Kerr,
| Winchester. stli
| Recording Secretary, Miss Margt. E. Crenshaw
| Richmond
Treasurer, Mrs. j. L.. Cochran, University o
I Virginia.
| VICE PRESIDENTS
| Mrs. John Paul, Harrisonburg.
| Mrs. j w. Newton Stanton
| Mrs. Susan b. Hoge, Winchester,
| Mrs. susanna Davis, Loudoun county. IL
| Miss Virginia Diggs, charlottesville
NJ. VI. c. 4. U. Headquarters ''''' ''''
THE VALUE WHICH A LOVING FATHER
| PLACES UPON HIS SON.
Consider me not ayaricious, my friend
! if | tell you | have set a price on my boy.
This is necessary, from the fact that
live in community that puts aprice upon
the boys, the girls, the youth. the man
hood and the womanhood of that COM
munity. Then judge me not harshly I'M
til you have compared my price with that
fixed by the community in which live,
and of which you and form part.
But before giving you my price, per-
haps a brief description of the boy may
not be out of place. He is now lust en-
tering upon the teens, the same dear little
boy whom we have nursed and handled
upon our knees, who has been the object
OF our love and devotion from his baby
hood up to the present and is now the
pride of his father and the hope of his
mother. He is in good physical health
with mental faculties all alert, quick to
discern between right and wrong, easily
lmblbing correct moral principles. In
short, he is a fair specimen physically.
mentally and morally of the youth of this
community, which, in its organized capac-
ICY, treats him and all others as proper
subjects for barter and sale. Perhaps YOU
may ask me by whom they are put in the
market? who are the buyers when,
where and how is this Internal traffic car
ried on against the lawso of God and man :?
Well, LII tell you, who, when. where and
how, on one condition-that is, if you will
do all in your power to put stop to it.
They are put upon the market by the law
making power of this country, this State
and this municipality, by fixing price, a
valuable consideration--a license fee
upon the payment of which man is per-
mitted to do, is licensed and granted the
privilege to do that which he had no right
to do until he bought the privilege. Now,
| it is clear that something is sold by one
party-the community of the law making
power bought by another party, the indi-
| vidtal who intends to use what he has
| bought !; and that is the privilege ito sell
| intoxicating liquors as a beverage. The
permission to set up a bar and sell liquors
in this way means the enticing. enslaving,
the moral degradation, the mental wreck,
the physical ruin and death of somebody's
boy in the vicinity where it exists. It
| means chance at a hundred boys, with
certainty that more than one will be en-
shared and degraded. When the license is
granted the granters know this fact as
well as they know that day follows night.
and yet for the consideration-the per
mission is granted-the license is given.
Is this not clearly a sale of somebody IS
hoy-together with his health, his imteg-
rity, his intelligence, his moral sensibili-
ties, his very life and all there is of him or
in him And while it is sale of some
body's boy, who IS to be sacrificed to fill
the eapacious NAV of this monster which
thrives upon misery, depreciation and woe,
it is the establishment of a shooting alley
in my neighborhood, and my boy. (being
human, and no better or stronger than
thousands who have fallenl is set up as a
target, at whom this skillful, Gendish
archer is permitted to shoot his poisoned
bringing some one down.
And l am asked by christian commu
nity-at least by the lawmakers of what
is called a christian people---how much /
want for my consent to this bargain, my
assent to this contract, my signature to.
his compact with Satan and agreement
with hell ? how high shall the license be !?
what shall be the fee ? Oh, shame! that
in this enlighted age such q question can
be asked. l answer, 0 ye rumsellers, go
gather in your. i'll gotten gains for a thous-
and years, pile up your gold until it is SO
high that it casts a dark and dismal shadow
over the highest mountain peak, and lay it |
at my feet and you have not tempted me.
Go, bring from among your kindred as
many victims as you have made
in ours-as many desolate homes, as
many bitter tears, as many heart
sobs-eye for eye, tooth for tooth, blood
for blood. soul for soul-and you have only |
my resolution not to sell. !
You don't wish to bay at such price /
But wait, have not told you all. Before
you get my signature to this hellish COM
pact, you must, at the peril of your life, |
sever my right arm from my body. discon-,
nectit from my body and brain, before
these fingers will sign your league with !
death. This is my price, MI. Rummy.
and these, are. my terms No sale, you
say? Very good. No sale, no saloon.-
Exchange. a
Liquor murders annually in the United
States, Thirty persons for every mile be-
tween San Francisco and New York.
Set up black monuments, thirty for
every mile, and let the people realize the
leadly influence of the hell-born and he'll
furnishing traffic California paper +"
One of the largest distillers in the coun-
ry says that the prohibition agitation
las decreased the consumption of whisky
ully forty per cent.
The Savannah Necs says: There is not
town or county in Georgia which has
ried it that does not report increased
prosperity as the result of closing the +
aloons. In Hamilton, prohibition
the per cent. Of taxation is the
m a1last in the State Where from at 90