Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1900-08-01
PROHBION IN MAINE.

LECTURER, CndI plouiottAon He
it's best opportunity to succeed ant
has met it's best success in Maine
Ithas been on the statute book
OF that State. for over forty year,
and has seen two generations grow
up under its operations. There
has been no legal sale of whiskeJ
in Maine during that period. Arf
the people temperate, more thar
: in. other places? Has it been en-
forced?
That conditions in Maine are
far worse than in South Carolina
or even in States where high
license prevails, all fair-mindeo
men must conclude.
A few years ago an association
of fifty of the leadil g preachers
college professors, educators and
andliterary men of the country was
formed to investigate the success
Of the efforts being made to curtail
the:consumption of liquor. This
association sent agents to q num-
ber of the States of the Union, in.
GLIDING Maine, South Carolina
Iowa, Massachusetts and Penn
sylania. Their agents spent
months in these and other States
and made thorough Investigations
taking nothing for granted and
accepting no information but what
they could verify themselves.
One agent reported that in the
city of Portland, Maine, having
less than forty thousand in
habitants-but little larger than
Columbia-he had found one
hundred aud eighty-two places
where liquor was sold, mot includ-
ing pocket peddlers, houses of i'll
! fame, express companies, clubs
and certain oyster restaurants" }"
That, ssWhile the present investiga-
tiion MAS in progress several new
bars were opened That the
sheriff of the county explained
the non-enforcement of the law
!. by asking him: aIf 8 landlord
cannot restrain one tenant, how
can four deputies deal with four
hundred rum-sellers?" The Port
land Express. in the issue of June
21, 1894, contained the following
protest of certain liquor dealers of
that city; "some liquor dealers
complain that their profits are cut
down by the competition of shops
allowed to exist in the vicinity of
their own places of business and
that the regular collection of pro-
lection money may also be made
of them. These demands are IN
some instances also said
to be 30 excessive that the dealers
say they swallow up the lions
share OF, the profits and sometimes
actually make them run more dis
reputable places than they other
wise would, in order to get in money
enough to be able to respond to the
perpetual squeezing"
The conditions all over Maine
were found to correspond with the
state of affairs in Portland. Every
town-the best and most orderly
of them-had its dozens of places
where the sale of liquor was open
notorious ssand unoposed. In
. Arostook County, with 1857
Inhabitants and no considerable
towns, IS United States revenue
licenses for the sale of whiskey
were taken out in 1895. Ellsworth,
with $500 inhabitants, contains
ID bars and 4 other places (apothe-
cary shops) where liquor is sold,
or one to about 219 inhabitants.
"Gam5ling was going on in several
. saloons visited by the agent of the
committee of fifty. In Augusta,
the Capital of the State, sixty-two
places were found in operation, or
one 10 every ITO inhabitants.
Throughout the entire State the
the same slckening array of figures
come-the same account that one
dirty, filthy hell hole, where the
yilest liquor is sold, is maintained
to every two hundred inhabitants
] of less. E
What has been the result? How
J has it effected the people of Maine?
! The published report of the COM
mittee of fifty, compiled by a SUBJ
. committee, consisting of the fa-
NOUS anti-whiskey reformer, Seth
J Low, of New York, President
Charles W. Elliott, of Yale
University, the greatest college in