The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1886-10-16
CRUSH THE SALOON.

CRUSH THE SALOON.
However Men May Disagree as to the
Manner of Killing 1t, the Awful Neces-
sity of Its Death Is Apparent.
Public sentiment is well-nigh ON
nipotent. 1t enacts laws; it speaks
through the judges charge; it gives
eyes to policemen; it governs the
crowd on the street, and like a subtle
atmosphere pervades all things, and
with commanding power. And pub
lie sentiment is rising up against the
saloon. Every day enlarges and inten-
sites the conviction that the dram
shop is an altogether useless and ire
deemably wicked thing, that it is a.
burdensome barrier equally in the way
of the highest civilization and of en-
lightened Christianity. Though toll
Grated in the past, its baleful, dreadful
influence has always been felt and pro-
tested against by the noblest philan-
thropists, as well 9s by the wretched
widows and orphans from whom it has,
taken the husband and the father
Nay, many time the poor inebriate
himself, the victim of his appetite, has
cursed the saloon as the occasion
of his downfall, his evil habits,
his loss of character, his broken
health, his rags and miseries and
blasted hopes. The hour is drawing
near when the very idea of man,
made in the image of God, running
into corner groggery to take drink
Of rum while standing on his feet will
seem utterly preposterous and absurd.
To be sure, such procedure was once.
the fashion; and so was the gaudy
dress, made up of the colors of the
maybe and the harlequin, in which
Oliver Goldsmith used to strut about
to his own infinite delight, but at which
the world now jeers as fantastic and
Iudicrous. There never was any neces-
sity for a man to stand up to bar and
to pour alcohol down his throat; and
henceforth such habit will be deemed
inexcusable, because unidentified, I'M
manly, disreputable, as well as moral
ly pernicious in example, and tending
only toward the degradation of hui
mainly and the destruction of human
happiness.
Men may differ widely about the
questions-whether taking glass of
wine is a sin per Sc, whether total alb
stinence, or the use of thing with
self-restraint embodied in the word
Temperance shall be the Christians
law, whether the absolute prohibition
of the manufacture and sale of ardent
spirits is practicable or otherwise, ETC.,
etc. but surely there is, or ought to be,
no ground of difference among all
good and thoughtful men on the de-
mand that the saloon must go. 1t has
already wrought mischief enough,
without ever doing one iota of benefit.
To attempt to put into language even
few of the awful crimes that have is
sued directly from the saloon would
seem like the outburst of rant. And
yet no words can begin to convey any
just conccption of the various forms of
vice and misery, of intellectual as well
as moral debasement caused by the
saloon. 1t Is infinitely pathetic
and narrowing for us to inn
agine just one nights doings IN the sa-
looms of this broad land. Who can bear
to think of the profanities, of the
malignant curses, of the demented
wits, of the violent and angry words,
of the bloody encounters, of the MUIR
ders, of the scalding tears and bitter
agonies, and unspeakable remorse
which were produced by the saloons
during just the last twenty-four hoursP
And what shall we say when we re-
member how these things are multi
piled during all the seven days of the
week and the fifty-two weeks of the
year? There is hardly family among
our sixty millions of the people which
has not been struck somehow and
somewhere by the saloon devil; and
therefore it is certainly wise and just
for all our families to combine for it's
overthrow. Let us agitate to make the
saloon disreputable, to secure ample
legislation against it, to help judge
and jury and policemen to feel and do
their duty with regard to it; to create
a public sentiment rendering it dis
graceful to peddle out standing drinks
and equally disgraceful to swallow
standing drinks--in short, let us be
loyal to humanity and to Christian
civilization and to God by crying
out and acting on the cry: down
with the saloonr'- Christian al Work.