The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-07-06
IOWA AND PROHIBITION.

a prohibition plank, and to substitute
therefor local option under high license.
II is q matter of deep regret that this sub
stirute was beaten by twelve majority;
with its adoption Iowa would be sure to
vote Republican. The Democrats have
been gaining ground ever since the ques-
ton Of prohibition came to the front, and
two years ago they elected their candidate
for governor on that issue. This year the
the prohibitory Law and the substitution OF
a carefully guarded License Law with min
imum impost Of $500, which may be in
creased by the municipality. So strongly
is the tide setting against prohibition that
one of the leading Prohibitionists of Iowa
saws:
Every day i hear expressions OF opinion from
persons whom ] have known for years as being
friendly 10 prohibition declaring their dissatis-
faction with the law and intention TO vote for
its repeal, while csndor compels me 70 admit
that have yet 10 meet man who has become
convert 70 prohibition within the last two
years.
So weak are the Republicans on this
issue before the people that the Des
Moines Register and the Keokuk Gate City,
two leading organs of the party, confess
that the Republicans Of Iowa must make
the fight national issue or defeat is GER
tain. The Gate City hopes that the Repub-
licans who are opposed TO prohibition win
defeat prohibition candidates and get a
legislature that will repeal prohibition if
possible.
The supporters OF prohibition include,
of course, some bigots who call all their
neighbors ''rummies" who do not agree
with them that prohibition is wise or
effective means to reach the moral end of
the increased sobriety of the people, and
on such persons argument is wasted; but
there Is another and far better class of
men who honestly confuse the use of law
with the abuse Of it as easily as they do
the use Of a thing with the abuse of it;
the regulation and restraint of sumptu-
airy right with its absolute extinction.
These persons insist that drinking, or the
sale of drinks, shall be treated as crime
and prohibited, Just as are gambling and
prostitution, but are such purblind and
inexsct thinkers that they fail to note that
the law does not prohibit playing cards,
but the perversion of card-playing to the
end of fraud; the law does not prohibit
the legitimate exercise and fuIfllment of
the productive instinct and powers of
nature. but prohibits their perversion to
base and pestilential purposes, just as the
law permits q man to become a pugi-
list brfr
statute against gambling attempts to
regulate card-playing, not TO abolish
1t, but the prohibition of the right to drink
does not mean simply that men who
abuse it shall be punished; it means that
no man shall sell it, whether he sells it
discreetly or not; that no man shall have
legal opportunity to buy it, whether he
uses 1t decently or abuses it TO the injury
of the public peace. We regulate card
playing; we regulate the sexual relations.
We do not attempt TO extirpate, and we
must be content TO regulate the drink
appetite, for We cannot abolish il, if we
would, by law, any more than We can
abolish hunger by destroying food.
The only person who can abolish the
drink habit is the man himself, and no law
can protect man against himself 1t can
protect him against the violence of others
ii can punish him for the consequences of
his evil habits, but it cannot furnish him
with that resolute, virtuous determination
which is the only successful agent in the
work of self-help and personal salvation.
The law cannot eliminate temptation
| from the Grid; offenses must be, and the
| law Furnishes the offender on the lust
ground that he is free moral agent and
responsible for his abuse of himself and of
| the rights of society whose peace, order
and welfare he impairs by his conduct.
There is no analogy between the abolish.
ment of human slavery and prohibition,
because slavery is crime per sc: it stands
| for the theft and conhscatIon of the prirn-
tive rights ofindividnal life, liberty, prop
erty and happiness, just as murder is a
crime by the general consensus OF the
Christian world without exception or
| qualification, but TO sell liquor or drink
| liquor is not crime per Sc, like human
slavery. The failure of the prohibition
philosophy lies in its absurd confusion Of
the distinction between vice and crime. be-
tween the function of q statute and the
function OF a sermon, or the func.
ton of a legislator who seeks 70
enact present public opinion with
the function of preacher who seeks 70
| enunciate the doctrine Of absolute Chris
tian rectitude without qualification or
compromise. The preacher, properly
enough. makes plea for the highest alb
stract good; he is doing the work OF per-
suasion. exhortation, education; his right
il is to say Don't drink" and there his
responsibility ends; it is optional with his
hearers 70 accept or reject his advice, but
! prohibition. when expressed in Law, saws
"You shan't drink" and with that fat
comes the responsibility of its enforcement.
Ii is, Of course, comparatively easy to
enact You shsn't, but il is impossible TO
enforce il against any considerable num-
hers in opposition. In community where
there is considerable number who buv
and drink liquor, or who hold that there
is no offense in buying or in drinking
liquors IT has always been, is and will ever
be impossible 10 enforce prohibition. The
incubation Of habits of temperance and
moderation in the employment of stimu-