Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1902-05-08
ments Of the employers they must be
men of sobriety.
The Women,s Work.

The Women's Work.
The first move that was made in
the state to secure any temperance
legislation was through the efforts of
the women. About ten years ago they
agitated the passage of the bill requir-
ing the teachers in the public schools
of the state to instruct the pupils con-
corning the evil effects of narcotics
upon the human body. At the time
this bill attracted very little attention
and was passed and became law and
this alone has had great deal to do
with the spread ofthe temperance SEN
timent through the state and the pass
age of the later prohibition acts. Said
one lobbyist of the state legislature,
who had worked many years in the in
terest of the saloon, at the time this
bill was being considered, this bill if
passed will be the rope by which the
liquor traffic in Iowa will finally be
hung" and this prediction has proven
true.
Iowa Leads the World.
1T is interesting to note the fact
that today Iowa stands in the lead
among the states and nations of the
world in the matter of temperance leg
islation and has provided for the care
of the drunkard and dipsomaniac. No
other state or government has as yet
declared, as Iowa has done in the bill
passed by the last assembly, that
drunkenness is disease and should
be treated as such. For many years IL
was thought that insanity was not a
disease and that the person so afflict-
ed was possessed of the devil Ac-
cording to this belief they were driven
away from society and even starved
and poisoned. This however, it was
learned. was mistake and 1t was
found that fifty per cent of the insane
persons can be cured. For years it
has been preached that drunkenness
was an evil and meanness and that
those afflicted with it were possessed
Of the devil. I believed it and have
even preached 1t but during the past
FIVE years l have been convinced that
this is a mistaken view and that
drunkenness is a disease. This con-
viction has been strengthened from
personal observation and l believe that
fully ninety per cent of the cases of
drunkenness are durable.
The Bill.
"On July 4 this bill enacted into a
law by the last general assembly will
take effect. 1t provides that there
shall Heterogeneous made at the state
hospitals for insanity for department
for the care and treatment of those
afflicted with the drink habit After
that date a person can lodge a COM
plant in the district court against any
one who habitually uses Intoxicating
liquors and the Judge can sentence
such one to not less than one nor more
than three years in the inebriate hos
pital for treatment. Aside from the
benefit it will bring to the user of in
toxicating liquors it will have very
great restraining power upon the
young as they will be less liable to be-
come habitual drinkers from the fact
that they may at any time be sentenc-
ed to the dipsomaniac hospital. But
some say to me this law in it's enforce
ment will work an injustice to the per-
son, it will rob him of his freedom and
free moral agency. But contend that
mans liberty should cease where the
good of others begin and when il
comes to place where man does not
amply provide for his family or when
it becomes impossible for him to leave
drink alone then there should be some
provision made for his treatment. Sc
the bill will work all over the state
We have worked silently and earnest
ly and by this law l believe that the
first bulwark of the great liquor traffic
has been carried by the friends of tenn
perance and that in the fight Iowa will
continue to lead"