The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1897-02-13
ADVANCED TEMPERANCE IDEAS.
New Features of the Temperance Ques'
tion Presented by Mrs. Hoffman.

ADVANCED TEMPERANCE ideas.
New Features of the Temperance 0ues-
tion Presented by Mrs. Hoffman.
The seating capacity OF the Vogt
opera house was taxed to its fullest
capacity to accommodate the audience
attracted there last night to hear the
lecture of Mrs. Clara c. Hoffman,
national secretary of the w. G. 7. U.
Mrs. Hoffmah has Il pleasant, motherly
appearance, though in her kind, pleas
ing features one can read irmuess and
strong personal character, and when
she faces an audience her hearers are
readily convinced that before them is
a speaker who is earnest in her con-
victions and honest in her beliefs. But
in the presence OF such speaker. one
would be disappointed if he heard any
thing bitter or personal, for she readily
wins the good opinions of her hearers,
and carries them along through the
thread of her argument so pleasantly,
that all have kindly feeling toward
her from the time she begins speaking
till she closes.
On being introduced by Mrs. w. H.
Biggs, president of the local union,
Mrs. Hoffman prefaced her address
with the question, "What advance
ment has been made in the cause of
temperance" She then proceeded to
show that the cause of temperance had
made rapid strides during the past 80
years 10 that public sentiment had so
changed that intoXicants were no
longer considered necessary to socia-
bility. Tho side-boards once seen in
the homes of the well-to-do in every
walk of life have almost disappeared;
setting the decanter and glass before
the visitor is no longer the custom; IL
is no longer deemed absolutely neces-
sary to supply the laborer with intoxi-
cants that he may labor. Religiously
too, the cause of temperance has ad-
vanced, since fermented wines are now
seldom used at sacrament; ministers
as O rule are teetotalers, and few
church members engage in the liquor
traffic in any form.
The next matter to be considered by
the speaker was the proper method for
advancing temperance, and on this
line Mrs. Hoffman certainly has ad-
vanced ideas. She would not waste all
the energies of temperance workers in
attempting to reform those whose
habits have been formed, but would
devote their greatest energies to edu-
eating the youth, and preventing them
from becoming habitual drinkers of
intoxicants. To accomplish this she
would have the effects of narcotics and
intoxicants taught in every public
school, from the rostrum and from the
pulpit. She would educate the youth,
warn him of the dangers to his physi-
cal and mental faculties from the use
of narcotics and intoxicants before
habits have been formed. She would
reverse the order of a majority of old
school Temperance workers by pre-
venting intemperance through thu
medium of education, and in this re-
spect she is certainly far advanced IN
her ideas.
That she is prohibitionist, the
speaker said there was no question.
but unlike the majority of temperance
workers, she had no special war to
wage upon the saloon keeper. "He is
as good as the saloon he keeps; the
saloon is as good as the law legalizing
it; the law is as good as the Legislators
who framed it; and the legislators are
as good as the people who elect them,"
said the speaker, hence the reason we
have saloons is because we want them,
because we still consider they are nee
essary. Her plan for abolishing them
is to remove the demand by every indi-
Yidual enforcing prohibition upon him
self, by his prohibiting the use Of in
toxicants through refusing their use.
Mrs. Hoffman's lecture was listened
to with marked attention, and that it
was well received by her hearers was
made evident from 20 members having
been added to the local w. G. T. U. at
the close of the meeting.