News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1891-04-23
TEMPERANCE.

TEMPERANCE.
WHY SHOULD MEN PUT Az ENEMY IN
TO THEIR MOUTHS TO STEAL
AWAY THEIR DRAINS?
This question was asked by a re-
pentant drunkard several years ago.
and no man has as yet answered IL
satisfactorily All men, even those
most addicted to it's use. condemn
the evils that result from drinking
whiskey, and yet these same men i'm
company with Others who do not
misuse the pernicious stuff, will de-
! liberately seek to establish its use
and misuse, legally, in the communi-
| ty of which they are citizens. Leav-
/ ing out all the sentimental and hui
manitarian aspects of the question:
admitting the danger that might re-
suit to individual liberty from ma
tiOnal prohibition; granting that the
country would derive a revenue from
| license, and that only those who are
already incorporate and depraved
would suffer from the establishment
of groggeries and the sale Of sublim-
ated poison, still the unanswered and
unanswerable question presents e.
self, as above: "Nhy should men
put an enemy into their mouths 90
steal away their brains2" No sane
man will dispute the assertion that
the expense, to society at large, ut-
tending the use of alcoholic liquor as
a beverage has been ten times ns
great as the revenue derived from It's
sale. We will suppose, as an instance.
that Wilson county would be iinan.
cially benefited TO the extent of $500
annually from license tax on the sale
of whiskey, and we will supposeagnin
that 100000 a year would be put
i'm circulation Gin business, and
while we are supposing cases we will
90 "A little further and suppose, or
make it little stronger and assert,
that the depreciation in the value of
property-iarm property, and school
property, and church property, would
be more than ten times this increase
in the circulating medium" when
sensible and substantial men and
women from abroad seeking homes
/ in the great southwest should learn
that the liberty-loving and proiessed
law-abiding people Of its garden spot
had deliberately introduced the Devil
and all his family and followers with
in their gates, and removed every
legal and moral obstacle from the
road that leads to death, damnation
and destruction. Thism may bestrong
language, fellow-citizens, but IL will
I stand the test of debate 1.-THE bur
\ den of proof is upon the piaiuud;"
you, the petitioners, let the public
hear from you. Give us some Of your
whiskcy saloon logic TO read 10 our
wives and children Sunday mornings
when the weather will not permit us
TO go TO church. Prove to us that
the grog-shop, the monte bank and
the chuck-a-luck box are as necessa-
ry to the social, moral. financial and
intellectual development of the COM
munity as are the church, the school
house and the savings bank, and we
will vote for whiskey first. last and
all the time" and while you are get
ting up your answers and cross in
terrogatories we will give you a basis
for your argument in summing up
your case: We spend annually in
the United States one billion dollars
for liquor, and Just oDe-half that sum
for bread. We spend six hundred
millions of dollars for tobacco and
eighty-fve millions only for public
education, and you might claim i'm
your argument that because we do
spend twice as much money for
whiskey as we do for bread, we need
twice as much of it, and that in
seeking to establish the saloon i'm
our midst you are only advocating
the commercial law Of supply and de-
mand, only you lose sight of the fact
that there are many poor helpless
men, women and children all over
this prosperous land who can get
neither whiskey nor bread because
other people must have one thousand
millions of dollars a year TO spend
for their whiskey, and six hundred
millions of dollars TO spend for their
tobacco, and by the time this sixteen
hundred millions otdollars has passed
through the saloons and the tobacco
shops there is no money left with
which to build school-houses or or
phans' homes or refugees for the aged
and poor and helpless. This is the
way the principle you are advocating
works. 1t is true that Wilson county
is a small place, comparatively, but
great principles act equally every
where, and will apply here on this
question as uneTingly as they would
in London, Paris, New York, or san
Antonio. where it is said that when
the children cry for bread they are
sometimes given-not a stone. but n
cocktail or a glass of beer
One of your arguments in support
of the saloon is that prohibition
does not prohibit" that whiskey is
sold in defiance of prohbitory law,
and that the county receives no
pecuniary benefit from its sale Let
us ask you n question or two: Nor
ally or legally, does the infraction OF
any law justify its repeal? Would
the few unholy dollars paid into your
county treasury rs tribute from the
vendors OF physical, mental and NOR
al poison be adequate compensation
for all the evils that you know would
result from legalizing their trade?
One other question and we leave the
case with you: If you should be
walked from your peaceful sleep some
night after the establishment of the
" saloon" by the tread Of slow and
heavy feet, and see your son, or your
brother, or your honorcd father
borne on litter to your door, with
a ghastly wound in his throat, made
by the knife of "one made mad by
strong drink how would YOU like
to answer to the question from your
mother, your daughter, your wife or
your sister: GLOW did YOU vote on
the whiskey question?'-[Fo Forrest
vile, Tex, Chronicle.
Immigrants are avoiding the new
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