Mississippi leader. (Jackson, Miss.) 1892-1895, 1893-10-31
BY BISHOP sPAuLDING.

genuine political and social movement
strikes its roots into the past.
1t is largely a result Of Christian in.
fiuence.
Horror of sin, as the poison fountain
of misery and death, and love for
sinful man, who, in the midst of what.
ever Disagreement and defilement, is
still Gods child and our brother, give
to the character of Christ infinite earn
cstness and infinite tenderness.
Is it not more divine to prevent than
to cure. to reform than to punish?
Are we not following the commands
of Christ when we investigate the
ca uses of physical evil, the laws of
bearings of poverty upon sin and crime,
and seek to orearrange our political and
social life in accordance with the re-
suits of such researches?
This is the direction il which the
Prohi hibition party desires to impel us
The evil wrought by cohoiic drink
IS now acknowledged and proclaimed
by all the organs of public opinion.
1t undermines health, enfeebles the
Will COdIStuS IhS lDliIti anu
animal passion.
1t separates hus bands and wives, di-
vides families and deprives children of
the home influence which nothing else
can supply.
1t lowers the standard of morals. fills
prisons and insane asylums with its vic
tins, and feeds the germs of corruption
in the body polite
1t is, in a word, the cause or the oc
casion of four-fifths of the crime by
which our national life is disgraced.
Is there n remedy for an evil, the
enornity of which all rccog nize?
The loss of faith in the effectiveness
OF persuasion, and the appeal to the
legislative power which tegan to be
made about the middle of the last CEN
tury, opens a new era in the history of
history Unpopular education was opened
when the State G tablished and main
tanned system OF schools
The same public opinion which
thrust the question of slavery into pol
itics and led to its abolition, is now
thrusting the question of the manufac-
ture and sale of alcoholic beverages into
politics, with view to their suppress
sion, for suppression in the opinion cf
mum bers of the most
earnest, the most religious and the
most intelligent Americans. is the only
adequate remedy.
High License No Remedy.
High license diminishes the number
of saloons, but not the quantity of
liquor drunk nor the amount of drunk
enness.
And then to license is, in way, to
approve; and a wise and good man can
not approve the liquor traffic
Whatever restrictions may be thrown
around its management the American
saloon is, and must continue to be, so
long as it shall be tolerated, nuisance
Its infuenc ce upon individual, domes-
tic, and national life is wholly evil
AS to the right of the State to pro-
hibit there can be no question, since
the right to repress crime involves the
right to suppress its chief cause.
Prohibition Can Prohibit.
The objection is also made that Pro-
laws are inc ffectuaL
They certainly are violated, though
not to the extent we are prone to
believe.
And then what laws are not violated?
Shall we repeal the laws against bri-
berry, against the adulteration of food
and drink, against the desecration OF
against adultery, against OBJ
scene publications, because they are
infringed?
All success is partial failure, all
is partial ignorance, all
is partial bar barism.
Infinite working in the, finite but
half succeeds.
After all that may be said of the in
operativeness of prohibitory legislation
it remains true that nothing else so
suppresses drunkenness and
the crimes of which it is the source;
and as we advance in knowledge and in
virtue the efficacy of such legislation
will become greater.
We are slow to believe that what has
not been done can be done.
When our Federal Constitution was
drawn up, there was not statesman
in Europe, proba bly, not one in Am
ca, who believed that such a govern
ment on such scale could endure.
Was not all history or argument
against its permanence?
Let us not be too conf nfident that what
the Old World has not done. we shall
not yet accomplish in the New.
We shall work out our national pro-
blems in our own way, and if we
once become persuaded that al
coholic beverages are dan
ger to the life and hcalthful develop
ment of free people, it shall not con-
Germ us to hear that no tyrant ever
dared go to the length of suppressing
the manufacture of whisky and beer.
Into the head of what tyrant could
such thought ever gain entrance?
Prohibition aud Pure Politics.
As we advance we shall more and
more identify politics and morality.
We shall look to what is right more
even than what is useful.
We shall esteem things less and man
more.
Within fifty years we shall be as
populous as all Europe is now; our
cities will be the largest in the world,
our wealth the greatest
II vice and pauperism, which drink
leads with either hand, be not checked,
the violent the envious, and the ignor.