The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1888-09-06
FACTS ABOUT Third PARTY nEN.
An Open Letter to DR.. John A. Brooks,
Prohibition Candidate For Vice.
President.

most temperance workers OF the State,
had addressed to DR.. John A. Brooks
the following open letter concerning the
attitude OF the third party men in the
pending campaign. Mr.. Lucas is fully
warranted in speaking for Iowa temper.
ance men, for he has done more to pro.
tect practical temperance legislation than
any score OF men who are now engineer.
ing the third party movement:
There appears in some Of your report.
ed speeches some things that appear to
me to be unfair to those prohibitionists
who do not look at this question as you
do. You have much to say of "consci.
ence votes" and "men OF conscience"
and such phrases in which you assert
that the prohibitionists who do not agree
with your wild goose third party move
ment are not acting accordingly to their
conscientious convictions. AS you and
I are co.workers in the same church and
acting together religiously, 1t is a query
to me when you became the keeper Of
the consciences OF your brethern.
You do yourself gross injustice, as
well as others, when you assume any
such position, for certainly, where there
are five prohibitionists who will not vote
your ticket for ever one who will, it
comes with poor grace with one to
charge the five for acting hypocritically
in their decision. Now, have, as you
we'll know, been a prohibitionist all my
life, and 1t is not saying anything in an
egotistic sense II I say have done as
much for the cause Of prohibition as you
have. You have been in Missouri for
many years, where the Democratic party
has been in large majority, and you
have been a member of that party, and
what have You done in that party or
with your third party to get prohibition ?
Absolutely nothing.
have been in Iowa and member of
the Republican party, and worked in
that line, and with what result? We
have one OF the best prohibition laws in
Iowa that has ever been made, and it is
as well enforced as any other law.
have followed no ignis fatuus of third
party impracticability. You have.
Now what is the result? My State is
prohibitory; yours is not, and yet. for.
sooth, because cannot conscientiously
follow your method that has proven a
failure, and abandon my own that has
proven success, I am to be accounted
as lacking in conscience. Did you ever
think, my brother, that it is possible
you are mistaken, and that the beam
may be in thine own eye?
Again, we have 10000 prohibitionists
in Iowa. OF that number $4,000 will
vote for the Republican ticket and 1000
for you third party ticket. Allow me to
suggest that it is probable that the 149
may be as wise and honest as the one. 1t
is true one man may be wiser than l49,
but it is not very good taste nor very
good morals for the one to say that he is
the only honest one.
land what is true OF the State OF Iowa,
is true the country over. As said be-
fore, you cannot positively hope to poll
more than one.fifth the actual prohibi-
ton vote for your ticket, and is it not
possible that the four who refuse to
vote it may be as wise and conscientious
as the one who does? When you say
they are not, you are violating one OF
the most cardinal priciples of the relig-
ion we both profess, to Judge not thy
brother"
While am at this matter there are a
few other things to which wish to call
yonr attention. The only States in
which prohibition is maintained to-day
are Republican States, and yet you make
your fight against the Republican party,
and your leaders assert that you have no
hope of electing your ticket, but you
wish to defeat the Republican party, so
that the Prohibition party may take its
place in 1892. Very we'll; look at the
result. You break down prohibition
when it is already established, for you
concede that the Democratic party is OPP
posed to the principle. You make
enimies with all men in the Republican
party by your fight against them, and
what is the result? You keep a free
whisky Democratic party in power for a
| oaparatiou at laast
But you begin to compare yourself to
the Abolition party, but you have stud
led history to little advantage if you can
see anything in that. If the Abolition
party had continued on its radical
ground what would have been the re-
suit? Slavery would have been national
to-day, for II Abraham Lincoln had taken
his stand on a platform of absolute
abolition he would have been defeated,
and slavery would have been more
firmly rooted than ever. So, the good
sense of the people said, we will pro-
hibit slavery in the territories where we