The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-10-27
FATHER or THE MAINE LAW.
Prohibition Urged by Gen. Appleton
Long Before Neal DOw's Day.


Long Before Neal DOw's Day.
New York Sun.
General Neal Dow of Maine( was so per-
sistent and vigorous a fighter for prohibit
ton that of late years his reputation has
overshadowed that Of many other earnest
workers in the cause, and people have es-
pecially overlooked the work of the real
father of the Maine liquor law and perhaps
the earliest public advocate in this country
of the principle of prohibition, Gen. James
Appleton who was born at Ipswich, Mass,
in 1885, and died there in 1862. This has been
the case to such an extent that in the Off
cial report of the Centennial temperance
convention held in Philadelphia in 1886 Ga
volume of about $50 pages entitled "One
Hundred Years Of Temperance" and meant
to be complete history of the temperance
movement in this country no mention was
made of General Appleton. The omission
stirred General Appletons son to action,
and he hunted up the records In the mat
ter.
General Appleton won his military title
by leading a regiment Of Federal soldiers
against England in the war of 1872 Later he
settled near Marblehead, Mass, and soon
became absorbed in the anti-slavery move
ment and the suppression of the liquor
traffic His convictions upon the liquor
question came upon him as sudden rev.
elation-so he declared to his family-whie
he was listening to an earnest debate in the
Massachusetts Legislature in 1881 Doubtful
whether the public mind was ready for the
most radical measure he prepared a petit
ton to the Massachusetts Legislature pray
ing tnaJ the sale OF liquor IN any quantity
less than thirty gallons should be forbidden
by law. There was no effort to conceal the
hope of the petitioner that the proposed
limitation would take from most people all
chance to get drunk. The petition awoke at
once the opposition Of the temperance peo-
pie, and it was denounced in print by the
Rev. Mr.. Hildreth, agent for the Massa-
chusetts Temperance Society, and others.
Mr.. Hildreth declared in the Salem Mercury
of Feb Is, 1882, that he could not determine
whether the petition was the work of
Q-s~ Df H.
cause General Appleton answered his
critics in letters, in one of which, printed
in the Salem Gazette, Feb. Is, 1882, he first
proposed an absolutely prohibitive law.
1t is upon these letters and the petition
which provoked them that General APP
pletons friends and family base their as
Sertion that he was the first man in this
country to publicly advocate the prohibit
ton by law of the sale or manufacture of
ardent spirits. The petition failed for want
of signatures, and no action was taken upon
it, The following year General Appleton
removed to that hotbed of radicalism, Port
land, Me-, where ne lived for twenty years.
In 1886 he was elected a member of the
Maine Legislature, and that winter an OPP
portunity came to him CT putting into Off
cial form his ideas upon the LIQUOR traffic,
when a petition regarding the license laws
was referred to joint committee of the
two houses. of which he was made chair
man. The report made by the committee in
1887 was written by General Appleton, and
in it all the arguments that he had urged
five years before were repeated. The re-
port was in favor Of a prohivitive law with
out qualifications Thus General Appleton
suggested in 1897 the law which was en-
acted in 1851 through the efforts of Neal
Dow and his followers.
In "Appleton's Cyclopedia of American
Biography General Appleton is called a
Temperance reformer." and his right to
this recognition is set forth thus: by his
speeches and publications he exercised great
influence upon public opinion in favor of
abolition and total abstinence. In his re-
port to the Maine Legislature in 1897 he was
the first to expound the principle embodied
in the Maine law" In the sketch of the
life of General Neal Dow in the same work
this passage occurs:
"He General Dow became the champion
of the project for the prohibition of the
LIQUOR traffic which was first advocated by
James Appleton in his report to the Maine
Legislature in 1897 and in various speeches
while member of that body. Through Mr..
Dows efforts while he was mayor (of Port
Iand) the Maine liquor law prohibiting I'M
der severe penalties the sale of intoxicating
beverages was passed In 1851