Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1886-03-07
lFor the Dispatch.
For the Dispatch.
To the Monticello Grape and Fruit
Growers Association Of Aibemarie
County. Va.

County. Va.
Gentlemen Your preamble and re-
solutions published in the Richmond
Dispatch February 2Sth have been
carefully perused and your doctrines
duly studied by the Undersigned, and
no doubt by many anxious citizens of
our Commonwealth who appreciate the
difficulties Of your position, and regard
you as patriots who love your country
and are earnestly DESTROYS Of State and
national prosperity. Certain it IS that
whatever is for the permanent good of
the whole must be for the good of the
parts constituting that whole and If
your position be the true one for the
nation it must he tributary to the ad-
vantage Of the majority Of individuals
entering into the population Of the
country. Now, we wish calmly and
without preiudicial bias to inquire into
the assertions you make and ascertain
their truth or falsity. You may rest
assured, gentlemen, that if the dis
coyery can be made that our country
is more nearly safe when the liquor
traffic is unrestrained than when
the arm Of the Law is inter-
posed for its restraint or suppress
sion, no one will have greater reason
for complacency than those whose pa
triotism now impels them to make sacri-
flee of time and means to secure some
prospect Of reducing the amount Of
drunkenness and consequent crime in
our favored land. You will give ease
to many hard-worked men, to many
anxious women, if you can demonstrate
TO the satisfaction of true patriots that
they can without guilt remain quiet
while the manufacture and sale of in
toxicants seem so largely successful in
bringing a fruitage of woe to the home
circle and a crop of disgrace to the
government. But otherwise, otherwise.
|. You assert that certain eXerti0ns
Of so-called temperance men tend to
coercire total abstinence. The dill
Guilty in sustaining this position is plain.
If We understand the plans and declara-
tons of these men, they reach no such
proposition. The law for which they
strive has in view the removal Of temp
tdtiOa to vice; vice acknowledged by
every thinker; vice that the under
signed is quite sure you, gentlemen.
have often seen and deplored in your
noble and honored county; vice that
has in past years been a serious diff
Guilty in the way of the usefulness of
our grand University, the pride,
as it is the honor, Of our native State.
Is there any tyranny, is there any
wrong, is there any violation of a citi-
zen's rights, when a wise majority of
the citizens, knowing the power of
temptation and that the most valued
interests of brain and muscle Saying
nothing of morals) are endangered, de.
termine to say to the few, You shall not
so endanger the many? Has it come
to this, that because the government
must look after the whole Of the popu.
lation, a few men whose pockets have
heretofore been filled by tempting the
young to ruin, and hence causing
great loss to the whole State, shall cry
out against the law and call it compul-
sorry total abstinence" when the truth
is all the law has in view and all that
it does may be seen in the prohibition
Ct an effort to ruin the young men to
get their money?