River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1891-12-10
The Evils of Intemperance.


Mrs. C. ID. Parker.I
that people need so much talking to on the sub
ject of temperance, when the evils of intemper
ance are so apparent
can understand WHY liquor makers and Gquo
sellers desire to hold on to this traffic; there il
vast money in 1t. But why should the masses o
the people seek to put money in the pockets o
the few, and ruin and degrade thousands upor
thousands OF human beings, fellow mortals, i,
more than can understand
The late Secretary Window said ''The saloon
system is, in itself, league of law breakers
whose example affords a most powerful stimuli.
to disorder of all kinds. IL openly proolaims its
| supreme purpose TO make money In its own way
| and at whatever sacrifice, By what right does
| il exist? / know of none"
How can any one think that saloons are a ben
| eft to this or any other place. 1t cannot be
| denied that all the money which is spent in
saloons does not do one particle Of good. II
might better. a thousand better be consigned to
the flames, and what an inestimable amount OF
harm it causes 1t enriehes the saloon keeper.
1 can think of not one other good that it does.
| Then who cannot see that If the money were not
| spent in the saloons there would be more to
spend at other places of business and for every
| necessary of life. 1t is a poor argument that
| have heard used, viz: that the most of the
money that is spent in the saloons. does not
come from the people OF the city Of River Falls
| bat from the farmers living adjacent to River
| Falls therefore we have more money TO fix our
| streets, &C. Tell me please, il you know, who
| has less money to squander in these iegaiized
dshs of iniquity than the farmer of to- day? And
how shall we excuse ourselves for putting temp
tations in the way of these weak, demoralized
| sinfnl brothers of humanity?
| What can say of a person who uses this argu-
| ment, "ohl somebody must sell It. They viii
| have it, We might as well have the benefit of
| the license money as anybody" 1t looks to me
very selfish TO say the least Better far better
| raise the money for improvement by direct
tax. We as a community pay the saloon keeper
u large salary to debauch aud drag down to the
| lowest depths of crime and pauperism, fathers,
| brothers, sons and husbands.
When we speak of the evils of intemperance,
| there is simply no estimating it. OH how much
we need Prohibition. l can hardly conceive
what our country is coming to If we do not work
| for this to a successful ISSUE
l realize that il is going to be long hard
| struggle The people of America have allowed
| a foreign element to come in here until now it
controls the liquor interest OF the United States.
Must we submit to this foreign power? Shame
| on American manhood If we must.
Look at the state of affairs in the "Cream
City," the boosted metropolis OF Wisconsin. Dr..
Parkhurst recently delivered lecture on Boys
and Girls in the Saloons of Milwaukee He
said, "There are many saloons in this city where
mere children are seemingly allowed to eongre-
gate" In one place he declared he counted
over forty girls under sixteen years of age on a
Sunday night, and sixty inmates of the Indus
trial School for girls testified that their first
downward step was tai IN in a saloon.
That the liquor traffio is great factor in our
government no one ca deny. The liquor men
care not if the men of The government are DEM
| ocrats or Republicans, so long as they work for
/ their interests. LIslen for moment to what II
| Clay Bascom of Troy, N. Y, said at a Prohibit
| ton convention, recently. Speaking of New
York city, he said, at was there, in the eighth
district, that the dram shops of the country,
represented by those orthodox Republicans and
| liquor dealers, Brodskey and O'Brien, turned
over the Presidency TO Harrison and the Cover
norship TO D. b. HILL" He spoke of the free
use of intoxicants in the White House, and at
Vice President Morton's hotel, the Storeham; of
whiskey champion Raum to the Pension Blu
| reau; beer champion Rusk, nominated by the
Brewers Congress, Secretary OF Agriculture;
liquor dealer Dave Martini collection of PEN
sions at Philadelphia; Defender Of the liquor
ring Judge Brewer of the Supreme Bench; Ed
itor of the Wine and Spirit Review to a commits
sion at Paris; editor Of the Liquor Journal
yolksblatt, of Cincinnttti, Consul to Germany;
liquor lobbyist W. L. Trabercrom, Treasury
Auditor; The debauchee and conniyer at sher-
IFS Office, Francis Bill leads, U. S. Marshall
the Evansville Sunday saloon champion, J. W.
Lemiek, rendered the U. S. Treasurership by
HaI rison; Secretary Foster. champion of rum.
This, believe, is the great secret of it all
A very large majority Of the men who are put
into offices of public trust, are men who favor
the stills, the brewrles and the saloons.
Before any great good can be accomplished in
a reform of this kind, good, pure honest men.
who are willing to work for the greatest good to
the greatest number, and who are above price,
must be elected to fill the office
Many say, Prohibition does not prohibit"
Listen for a moment, please, to what Gov. Bur
leigh says:
THAT Prohibition has accomplished a vast
work for temperance in Maine no candid man
will deny. The liquor traffic is no longer re-
spectacle. II is under the ban of popular con-
demnation. Those who engage in il are Grimm
ais IN the sight OF Lne law. Ine open dram
shop, with its Haunting signs and alluring win
dows, is no longer feature in our state. The
rumseller is forced into dark corners. He has
been obliged, like other criminals, to resort to
concealment and stealth, where, before the adj
vent of Prohibition, he pursued his traffic with
openness and ostentation. The whole traffic
has been forever relagated to the furtive ways
of crime. IT is not easy to estimate fully the
great temperance work which this change has
wrought in Maine. But there still remains
much TO be done in so educating public senti-
ment that il shall everywhere insist upon the
faithful enforcement of the laws. Maine stands,
by the emphatic declaration of her citizens, in
the very van of temperance states"
How was it in our own city a little while back,
when we had one short year of prohibition?
Did we, every day we walked on Main street,
see men and mere boys (they-may have been p
years OF age) going IN and coming out of the
saloons and Keeling on the Sidewalks Did we?
Did we see men in their wagons going home in
10 the country, sit nearly bent double, Keeling
from side to side Of lashing their horses into a
furious gollop2 Did we? Did we have any
tragic deaths from alcohol in that year of Pro-
hibition in River Falls? Did we?
The longer prohibition is continued, the
greater its benefits believe If prohibition had
| been continued until now, there would be yely
little liqnor, if any, sold to-day, even ION the
| sly.
OH how we need prohibition in our states
and Nationl
Massachusetts manufacturer, in payment
| of his seven hundred operatives, gave each one
| crisp new ten dollar bill. Each of these bills
was marked, so that it could be recognized By
the Tuesday following, four hundred and ten
| of these seven hundred bills had been deposited
! IN the banks by the saloon keepers
Fred Douglass Prohibitionist, says: "The
colored people have good many enemies, but
no one of them all is destructive TO their best
interests as their whisky-drinking custom.
slavery robbed them of their bodies, but whis
key destroys both soul aud body, and casts them
into the horrid pit of degradation and ruin.
| Few things could do more for the elevation and
happiness of the colored people than the Danish
ment of intoxicating liquors"
| We need prohibition for the rising generation.
| oh! for boys who can walk with firm, steady,
manly tread, and who have purpose in life and
a will to carry it 10 successful issue, without
cigar or pipe in their mouths
/ somehow, when | see man, young or old,
with cigar or pipe in his month, he never looks
so well TO me thereafter, AMI If him intoxi-
Gated. 1 loath him. / always think their souls
are being stained with that which can never,
never be washed away. They may wear a
broadeloth suit, silk hat, kid gloves. no matter
how finely they may be clothed, there is black
ness, filth, corruption within.