The Labor enquirer., 1886-11-13
pRoH1 s1rioN WILL NOT PROHIBIT.

United Labor party marched to victory.
PRoHIB IBITIoN WILL NOT PROHIBIT.
Men drink because they are un-
happy" is an assertion which the prohi-
bitionists would do we'll to look into and
see how much of truth lies therein.
The people who believe that intoxi-
cants can be legislated out of existence
fail to take other than superficial view
of the causes which are operating to
make men addicted to liquor drinking.
The man who becomes addicted to the
use of intoxicating drinks ls only choos.
ing a slow method of suicide. Suicide is
a means taken by unhappy human be-
ings to rid themselves of their unhap-
piness; consequently if the condition of
men is changed from an unhappy to
happy one they will have no cause TO-
suicide by the Incorporate use of intox-
cants.
The man who tolls ten, twelve or
fourteen hours per day must be, and
generally is, physically exhausted to
such degree that liquor alone can give
him the temporary bracing up he feels
80 much in need of. Long, weary hours
of exhaustive toll 80 unwinds the main.
spring of the human machine that a man
feels, as the writer has often felt after a
wearying days toll, careless enough to
do most anything that will give him
even momentary forgetfulness Of aching
bcnes and exhausted vitality.
OF course the prohibitionist will say
take aTav the saloon that it may not be
a temptation in the road of the man who
is physically exhausted to that degree
that he becomes incapable of controlling
his desire for stimulant.
WHY not take away the necessity for
the brutal expenditure of physical force
which leaves the man in such deplor-
ably careless condition?
A volume might easily be written in
answering the question, why do men
drink
The only purpose of this necessarily
contracted article is to aItem 1T to show
that what is needed is not 80 much the
legislsting away of intoxicants as the
leglslating away of the causes that drive
men to seek surcease of sorrow in drink.
The man who tolls all day for just
enough to procure the bare necessaries
to prolong existence is compelled to live
! in home in which there can be little of
the things which make home beautiful
and pleasant He cannot procure books
and pictures, music or the beautiful and
elevating things which the hand of art
produces for all those who have wealth
10 buy.
The poor mans house is place nee
essarilY destitute of all those things
which are calculate to make home a
place of beauty and happiness. the
poorest, and even the lowest in the So
cial scale, can"be attracted by the bright
and beautiful. even the Indian can be
enticed by the flaming colors of
striped blanket or the lustre of string
of glass beads.
Even the poor. ign )rant workingman
can distinguish the difference there is
between the cherries place he calls his
home and the place called the saloon.
In the latter there are pictures n the
walls and beautiful mirrors and oftimes
works of art in wood aud marble; all of
which are in strong contrast with the
bare walls of the workingman's home.
1t is only natural that the man should
be inclined to prefer the place with the
glittering mirrors, pictures, ETC., instead
of the place with the bare and cherries
walls.
If the prohibitionist would turn his
attention to making it possible for the
workingman TO procure more than
scant and uncertain allowance of the
commonest necessarles, he would do
more to check the increasing number of
suicides from drink than it Is possible
for him to ever doFhile he begs and
prays Of hungry and toilworn men to
vote away that by the aid of which they
can escape for a little while from the
miseries and hopelessness of their wage
slave condition.
THIS is not q very fattering testimo.
nisl to the ambition and high-minded- |