The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1890-07-18
STUBBORN FACTS.
FIGURES SHOWING THE FALL
LACY OF HIGH LICENSE.

Solid Arguments Against It Condensed for
Everyday Uss-Points Worth Preserve
ing for Use in Prohibition Campaigns.
From the Northwestern NALL
Prohibitionists do not believe in high
license, nor any license. Indeed, they
oppose the principle and policy Of all
license laws concerning the traffic in
liquors as u beverage. However, there are
many people whose integrity of purpose
and independence Of character need only
u vision Of the facts to show to them that
their present faith in high license is as
futile Us their earlier faith was in low
license.
1t is for the purpose of reaching those
people by putting into the hands of pro-
hibitionists q concise statement of facts
touching this question that we have COM
piled and publish what follows.
Briefly Summarized, the defense put
forth by these persons is:
First, high license decreases the o n
sumption Of liquors; second; it decreases
the number of drinking places; third. it
| decreases drunkenness and crime result
ing; fourth, it confines the traffic to bust
ness c%enters, and the places are made re-
spectacle; fifth, it is o step toward pro-
hibition; sixth, it draws the saloonist out
Of politics; and seventh, the saloon men
are. opposed to it.
The points taken are all questions of
fact. Each is either true or false, and
with q purpose to reach only the truth,
let us inquire:
l. Does High License decrease the
consumption of liquorP The license fee
has been steadily increasing the nation
over for the past ten years, SO has the
annual per capita consumption of liquors.
The per capita consumption of distilled,
malt and vinous liquors in gallons, fol
the year 1881, was 1857; for 1882, II. "a;
for 1883, l2.11; for 1884, l2.45; for 1885,
l2.06; for 1886, 1890; for 1889, IL. SO.
2. Does High License lessen the mum.
Der Of drinking places? Here n mus
discriminate between the effect of license
and Of prohibitory clauses in laws which
laws could be as we'll enacted with q low
license law or independently as in con.
nection with q law for high license
Pittsburg, Pa, has 80 saloons paying
$500 license each, and according to In
spector McAleese it also has 700 @speal
easies" running under the names o
boarding" rooms to let" etc.
Chief o. J. Brown, of the Department
of Public Safety, has put the number Q
unlicensed places which continue to sci
at 800. Philadelphia, under the sam
license fee, hasa, 900 speak %easies." Th
Pittsburgh Commercial Gazette (Rep
of the select 700 speak easies' were rur
} ming wide OPEN" The Philadelphi
Ledger (Rep.) y The raids on til
speak easies' show that there is n gres
deal more illicit liquor-selling, especial
on Sunday, than the average citizen know
J anything about"
: The Philadelphia Press (Rep.) say
r HAll accounts agree That high license is
failure in Pittsburgh. Speak e%asies,' {
unlicensed saloons. have SO multiple
that it is now believed that the number c
(, places where liquor is sold is considerabl
greater than it was two years ago unde
low license"
! This last statement is so plain and tn
. authority 80 good that it does not seer
! longer possible to doubt that hig
license does not decrease the number O
r places where liquor is sold even thong,
it does decrease the number of license
places.
3. Does High License decrease til
! drunkenness and crimes resulting? TAX
, the facts as presented to US by the his
tory in Rhode Island. In 1885 the cite
in THAT State were under low license and tn
arrests for drunkenness and reveling j
Newport, Woonsocket and East Prov
1 dence numbered during d year 7lt
During the next two years the State wa
under Prohibition and the arrests for tn
same cause in the same cities fell off
457. The next year high license pr,
t vailed and the arrests in places and fl
: causes named reached 1913. But is tn
h view too narrow and are the cas-
isolated2
y The following table is compiled fro
: police statistics. The license fee for IL
8 first Al cities is not less than $500, IN
y the first 8 cities have a fee of $500
The highest fee that any of the last
h cities has is 5000, and the last II have 5
n or less. The summaries show tn
scarcely fewer arrests for drunk and di
=. orderly are made per capita for popul
3 ton in high than in low license cite
while the per cent. the arrests for the
o~ffenses bear to the total arrests is larg
in high license places.