The Press., 1896-07-02
w. C. T. U.
An Appeal for the Boys.
 RV q c RuRNETT
I Cs 5. BU hN FIT.

INV. U. T. U MeQdl contest R6ClUaUlOn.
 A question in importance overshadow- ing all others faces us to-day. It is this {: What is to be the character of our citizen ship in the new century we are so soon to enter? However great our interest in pol itics, in tariff or silver, or labor, we real ize there is 8 still greater question-one which, indeed, is the end of all politics and government-The Child.
 Building character is the great work of our public schools. We want to place on this broad domain a people "who shall know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain.'
 The putting into the generations that shall follow us the character that can be trusted anywhere is the thing to be aimed at We want our boys to be
 ''Truly equipped for life's mystic battle
 Helmet fastened and sword in hand"
 We must fight the great battles of the world through the children. The secret which decides the fate of any battle is found in the preparation which goes be- fore. It is true of battles for reform.
 The eye of this generation should be fixed upon the young. There is an army marching forward, in which every man may be a hero, made strong in mighty conflict. Put your ear to the ground and you may hear them, Tramp, tramp, the boys are marching."
 Whether they march to victory over self, victory over foes without as well as foes within, depends upon the habits they are forming during childhood and youth.
 Within recent years an insidious vice has sprung up all over our land, and our brightest boys are falling victims to it's prey.
 This vice is the narcotic habit in all it's forms, and especially in it's worst form the cigarette. The evil has grown to such mighty proportions that state legislatures and school boards have listened to the appeals of the brave band of white-ribbon women, and have given legislation and secured the enforcement of the laws in many places.
 Parents, will you do your part? Will you aid in the educational work? Will you aid in the enforcement of law? You can get evidence needed for conviction if you try. I ask you to look in the faces of so many of our boys who have formed this habit, and see how the better nature is being crushed out by this vice, and know that no boy is safe so long as our laws are violated with impunity. Your boy may be tempted and may fall. Just as good boys have fallen. Place the bar | riers of enforced law about him. The man who would wrong your son by sell | ing this poisonous drug to him deserves greater punishment than he who robs you of your property; yet you are raising no voice, lifting no hand to protect them. | Why? Partly because you do not know the dangerous nature of the "deadly cig- arette." A committee of United States senators appointed to investigate the na- ture of cigarettes, when legislation against their sale was pending, brought in re- port that they are all injurious to youth, and congress passed the law that the wo- men petitioned for. A petition for this law was signed by the teachers and min isters of the District of Columbia, and two hundred and fifty-seven physicians
 Prof. Hartigan, of West Virginia Uni versity, says: "The effect of continued use of this narcotic is to paralyze the will so that considerations that would inf1u- ence we'll man have little weight with an old devotee of the pipe or quid." He also says: '"The use of the cigarette has tendency to foster in the young inclina- tions destructive of high moral principle" " The testimony of teachers and Sunday school workers everywhere confirm this.
 Professor Mardis says: "Fifteen boys fell out of the tenth grade in one year from the use of tobacco" He now has an Anti Tobacco League in every room, with excellent results.
 Professor Morris, of Alliance, O., says ''Tobacco is our greatest enemy"
 The principal of St. Clairsville, Ohio, schools says: Boys lose interest in school work, become truants, fail in ex- animation and fall out of school soon af- ter the tobacco has been fixed"
 The president of Ada, Ohio, Normal School, where are over two thousand young people fitting themselves for teach CTS, says: Several boys here died last year from use of cigarettes" Two boys were sent to the insane asylum from Hi ram College from their use, in one year. The school boards of New Yorks, San Francisco, St. Louis and many smaller cities are pushing vigorous campaigns against the habit. Why should not all schools take hold of this work Why spend money so freely and permit condi- .tions that make it of none avil?,
 Four girls are now graduating from our high schools to one boy, and women are capturing all places of honor and profit because her brain is free from nicotine poison. Unless there is an improvement in the personal habits of our young men in the near future, the bright young wo.