Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1888-04-06
HIGH LICENSE AT WORK.
How It Prohibits Prohibition
and Fails to Root Out
Rum.
Under an S645 License the Sa-
looms of Kansas City Have
Nearly Doubled.

,
looms of Kansas City Have
| Nearly Doubled.
Illustrations from Illinois, Pennsyl.
vania, Minnesota, and Other
States.
The Kansas City Herald has been eS-
posing the utter failure of the very extreme
high license system prevailing in that city
and the Infamous abuses being practiced
under it. The facts produced are even
more startling than those given recently in
the Voice for Chicago by Samuel w.
Packard. And yet Kansas City enjoys the
benefit of saloon license three tifths
larger than Chicago's.
Kansas City changed from low license to
high license in April. 1882. Previously to
that time the saloon license fee was $50
year. and under that fee there were $50
saloons at the beginning of 1882. The Ii
cense fees charged after April, 1882, were
| $3.50 to the city and $3.50 to the State and
county, making total fee Of $500 year,
which has since been increased to about
Ss45. Under this high license system
there were on Jan. l., 1888, 440 saloons,
and at the beginning of February AL.
Thus, although the license is nearly six
saloons has nearly doubled. The number
of saloons has probably increased much
| beyond the ratio of the increase of popu-
| lation.
| For the year 1887 there were 1920 az
rests in Kansas City. of which 3,U24, or
more than 3S per cent, were for drunken
ness. No record of arrests for drunken
ness was kept in the last year of low Ii
cense. But no comparative figures are
needed for one to understand that with the
| arrests for drunkenness forming 3S per
| cent. Of the total, an $50 saloon license
| is not dazzling success as a Temperance
! scheme.
| The Herald gives vivid pictures of Kan
sas Clty's barrel houses, which are liquor
| dens of the lowest order: there are about
| 2oo OF them, counting as such saloons
! where barrel house whisky is sold.
These barrel houses" entice hundreds Of
workingmen who come to the city in the
fall, having. during the summer, saved
from 500 to Sl0n by working on the rail-
| roads and III the country. Regular gangs
of thieves, called "ho-bos, hang around
| to rob the workingmen after they have le-
come sufficiently intoxicated.
Scarcely night passes during the fall
and early winter months that some honest
| worklngman does not rush into police
| headquarters and report that he has been
| drugged and robbed and pounded in bar
rel-house. He usually bleeds like stuck
| pig from scars and wounds inflicted upon
| him with beer mallet or billy. OF course
/ when the police enter the barrel-house
where the robbery and assault have been
committed the bartender and proprietor, if
he is present, and every 'ho- DO in the
&c hat
plains did not have a cent, and was not
struck or injured in the house. Being pen
niless and friendless the man is apt to go
into winter quarters in some other barrel
house, and thus one more bum: or crinI-
inal is added to the already large number
in the city.
The SS45 saloon license in Kansas City
does not seem to have purified politics
from the corruption of the liquor traffic.
There is regulation requiring the sigma
| ture of majority of the tax-paying citi-
Zens Ct the block before saloon can be
licensed. The Herald asserts, upon proof,
that the officials and Judges are so lax in
the enforcement of this regulation that not
more than IS per cent. OF the saloons have
legal existence. One case cited bv the
| Herald is particularly fragrant. Spengler
a. Rompel run fine saloon at 622 Della
ware street. The application upon which
this saloon was licensed was signed by only
eleven names, although investigation shows
that there are l44 competent signers in the
block. Among the eleven signers was Judge
Mcdonald. before whom the application
for license came. The Judge must have
been aware of his personal knowledge that
the number Of signatures was far too small.
yet he granted the license without Dues
ton.
The saloons of this SS45 high license
city pay no attention at all to the Sunday
law and the law against selling to minors.
In fact, the saloons run the town, elect the
officials, defy the laws, and do precisely
us they please with the law, and the peo-
pie seem to understand the situation very
we'll. Judging from the tone of the speech
es made at a recent Law and Order mass.
meeting.
And yet, although the saloons have un-
limited sway in Kansas City and can have
anything they want by simply going ahead
and reaching for it. they do not seem to be
disturbed at the size of the license. They
squeal piteously at any attempt to enforce
the Sunday law, ana the telegraph never
fails to report such attempts and the terror
OF the saloons resulting from them. But
no report has ever been made of sa-
loon dissatisfaction in Kansas City with
the S845 high-license law.
The Dismal ana Complete Failure of the
High-License Law i'll Illinois.
Letter from Quincy, H.
This is the city of the great Dick Bros.
Brewing Company, the Secretary OF which
recently wrote to the liquor men in New
York that the $500 Illinois license system
does not "lessen the consumption of
liquor" and that 1.-The trade should not and
reasonably will not Object to it. . The stat
lstics OF the saloon business in the city
show toat the testimony OF the Dick Bros.
Brewing Company regarding the harmless
ness OF the high license law TO the liquor
trade is amply sustained by the official
books.
The fiscal year ends on the first Monday