Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1893-03-15
a movement

Inc progress OF a temperance movement
on business lines.
It is practical temperance work that
the railroads are doing. and tremen-
dously effective. Most of the great
railway lines of the eastern half of the
United States enforce a practical ex-
clusion of drinking men from their
employ. Their officers take the COM
mon sense view that where the safety
of life and property depends upon
employees, it is necessary that the lat
ter shall, at all times, be in full pos
session of all their faculties. They
need the clear brain. the sure eye, the
certain hand He whose brain is be.
logged by liquor has none of these.
1t is not alone the railroads which
are thus discriminating against drink
ing men. In our cities, the rule Of en-
ploying only men of sobriety is increas-
ingly followed. No wise business man
will employ a drinking man in any
position of trust, particularly any one
which involves the handling of money.
Note the records of thefts. embezzle-
ments and defalcations by trusted EN-
ployes, and you viii find that the origin
of the trouble was the habit of drink.
Men are learning that they must have
non-drinking employees If they expect
their business enterprises to prosper.
1t was not many years ago that drunk
enness was tolerated in IN employee if
he were industrious and faithful; o
it is not so. A man may possess a
list of virtues as long as the moral law,
but If he possesses not the one of So
briefly, the list counts as nothing. Ex-
p~erience has taught business men that
they cannot rely upon drinking men,
and that TO employ them leads to loss,
to error, to vexations, delays and
worries. Hence they will have none Of
them. They want sober men, or none.
This business discrimination against
the liquor habit is bound to go on in
ereasingly. As it is to-day, all the bet
ter class of positions can only be held
by men of known sobriety. Hence il
follows that the best preparation a
man can make for his life work, if he
expects to ever be more than a com
mon d~ay-laborer, is TO have the repu-
tation of perfect sobriety, and to live
up to that reputation. Total abstinence
is the best policy for any man who has
to depend upon employment by other
men, and he can do better by adhering
strictly to it than by any other possible
course. He may think that an oeca-
sional glass is not hurtful, but il the
knowledge Of hat kind of indulgence
reaches his employers ears, he will
have lost more than he can hope TO re-
gain in years. The employer himself
may not be a temperance man; but II
he is a shrewd, sharp business man, he
will not allow a drinking man in his
employ. Young men, and men in the
employ of others, should realize that.
in the fullest sense, it pays to be en-
tirely sober; yes. and to shun even the
appearance of indulgence, or of close
intercourse with those who are adj
dicted to the habit 1t pays TO be a
total abstainer; and this argument
grows more and more forcible every
1t is this practical kind of temper
enforcement which is one of the
educational agencies TO accomplish the
work which must be done in order to
crush out the saloon. No one-not
even a drinker-finds fault with a rail-
way official who discharges or refuses
to employ drinking men. Every one
knows they are not reliable. The Off
cials are not called ''cranks," nor wis
ionaries,v nor Temperance fanatics +"
realizes that it is a strict
.n.tto~ "a I.s... .--1s.. ALL 4
and cents. Let the fact be once well
drilled into the masses that, no matter
how excellent in every other respect a
man may be, If he drinks he cannot have
any employment above the grade of a
common day laborer, and self-interest
will lead men to wipe out the saloon
and to pulverize the rum power To
edo Blade.