The Goodland republic. [volume] (Goodland, Kan.) 1891-1907, 1895-08-23
lTI0IIG PROHIBITION Law.
Worse Than Failure in Protecting Youth
From the Drink Evil
The History of GoodIaHd Bears Witness
to the Inability of Prohibition to Pro
hibit the Sale and Consumption of In
toxieaiHg Liquors.


TIE REPUBLIC has been taken to
task for its seeming stand against the
enforcement Of the probibitory law in
GOOdland. The benefits or ills of this
particular statute has been mooted
question in Goodland since its history
first began, and it must be admitted
that even in tho face of costly indict-
ments prohibition has failed to pro
hibit When stringent enforcement of
the law has driven the more respectable
JOINT or saloon out of business, the
bootlegger has fiouFished and waxed
fat upon the illegitimate traffic in
bac2hanalian supplies, selling his poi
sonous wares as freely tomere babes as
to men Of lawful age, the shibboleth of
competency being the production Of
current coin to exchange therefore.
After several years of unsuccessful at
tempts TO obliterate this blot upon the
public escutcheon, the city officials
initiated a system that put this traffic
under the eye of the law and at the
same time made it pay tribute to the
much depleted city exchequer-the
only system that has proven a success
in handling this evil, not only here, but
in every state in the Union. Under
this system the city collected every
month about enough funds to pay its
running expenses, which had become
too great to be met by lawful taxation.
This revenue has now ceased, owing
to the enforcement Of a fanatical blue
law, and the solving of the problem of
paying municipal debts with nothing.
cGnfrOnts the worthy board Of city
fathers.
City warrants are at a discount of 80
per cent, and would be more so only
that the municipality stands the dis
cOunt-that is, issues a warrant for
double the amount of Indebtedness in
CURED, upon which it pays interest at
the rate Of 6 per cent. No blame can
be attached to the city officials for this
action, as it is the only way the ''prO-
misses to pay" can be aOated. War
rants are yet unpaid that we're issued
five years ago, and the interest upon
them, and upon the bonds that have
been issued, reach enormous proper
tons. The tax levy has been put to
the limit and still a deficiency exists
and goes on increasing day by daY.
Seeing that prohibition has proven
failure in every state in which it has
been tried; seeing that the revenue
upon the traffic is lost to no benefit;
that minors can never be protected
from bOotleggers and unscrupIOus out
side vendors, leads to the conclusion
that a license law is superior to prohi-
bitiOn, and in the absence of the Grst
and the presence of the latter, every
city should be allowed to govern the
traffic according to the best interests
Of the community. This conclusion is
drawn from no emnity to temperance,
or friendship for intemperance, bat
from a careful view of events as they
have transpired and now transporting,
and there is no doubt but that the con-
sensus of public opinion will be found
on the same line.
When prohibition strikes at the real
root Of the evil and attacks the manu-
facture of intOxicants, then will pro-
hibitory statutes be of some avail, and
until that time sectional prohibition
will be a burlesque and a failure.