Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1888-12-15

which we all are seeking permanent
solution. If the expenditures of our
people for useful and needful articles
of food, clothing, etc, were increased
one-half, the domestic trade of the
country would be increased oue-half.
The only ones who would suffer
would be the men who make and
deal in Rum; but the increased eX-
penditures in other lines would re-
quire corresponding increase in the
means Of production. Our farmers
would find sale for one-half more of
their products; our factories would
need to be increased in mum uer, or
their force of operatives be enlarged;
our merchants would enlarge their
stores, and new ones would be added;
and the increased demand would
furnish labor for tens Of thousands
more of working men and women.
1t to be remembered that when Il
man spends money for Rum, he
gets no equivalent for his money.
He buys a coat, which lasts him for
months; but while he is wearing it,
he drinks dozen times its cost, and
has nothing tangible to show for the
Rum he has imbibed, unless it be the
evil that it does him. And it is not
to be forgotten that the number of
men it takes to produce a thousand
dollars worth of drinks Of Rum is
much smaller than it takes to pro-
duce 81 900 worth offOod, or clothing,
or any other necessary of life. The
vast bulk Of the money paid for
Rum goes as profit into the pockets
of the salOOnist; in any other case,
the bulk of it is paid to workingmen
as the cost of production. 1t is the
one form of traffic which pays the
least, in proportion, to the labor
which produces its staple, because it
requires comparatively less actual
labor to make Rum than almost any
thing else.
1t is traffic without one redeeming
feature. 1t is an ulcer in the civili-
zation of the nation, eating out the
vitals. 1t is IA burden on every
legitimate occupation, robbing each
and every one of them of one-third
of its legitimate trade. Every
manufacture every farmer, every
producer of food or any other neces-
sary of life, every business man
whose occupation is the traffic in any
of these necessaries and comforts of
life, should look upon the Rum traffic
as his own personal enemy, robbing
him every year of one-third of the
sales he would make were i not for
this internal burden, of which he
must carry his share so long as the
cause is allowed to exist. From a
position of indifference, all these
classes of people named should spring
into active opposition to this internal
tax upon the people and the legiti-
mate trade and industry of the
nation.
The better elements are beginning
to see this evil in its true light, and
the Blade proposes to continue doing
all it can to aid in their enlighten-
ment. There is no use in paltering
about the matter. Human patience
is weak, and appetite is strong. The
world will never be redeemed from
the curse of Rum so long as men are
weak enough to indulge in it. So
long as men will drink, so long will
Rum be made and sold, and so long
viii, the money that should be spent
for the necessaries, the comforts, the
luxuries of life be poured into the
Golfers of the Rum Power and so
long as this is SO, so long will the
Rum Power exert its baleful efforts
to extend the drink evil, and to bring
men under the dominion of the Rum
thirst. There is but one means of
lifting this onerous burden on all
legitimate business, and that is,
through Prohibition, to
Pulrerige the Ralm Poorer.