The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-02-15
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to treat it as a crime and punish it as
crime. 1t should be strangled without
the benefit of the clergy, with the stake
of public opinion thrust through it's foul
body
We should be ashamed to write on
the dollar and cent aspect OF the traffic
with the black shadows of the misery it
inflicts hanging over us. One hundred
and fifty million dollars annually are ex-
pended for liquor in the United States.
What an infinitesmal figure the license
tax cuts compared with this colossal
pile of blood money. What is the cost
of your jails. aims houses. reformatories.
criminal courts, insane asylums, charged
in the account.
The licensed bar is where the
smut OF the world is retailed, where the
gambling bells. Drize-fighting are most
securely enhenched. There is rotten and
rotting humanity under its gas lights. II
there is a difference between the gilded
saloon and the tipping shop in the in
corporated towns, it is simply the diff
ferences between broadcloth and fustian;
both hold a mortgage upon the depraved
stomach.
The drunkard must go and will go, and
the sooner the better, but for the sake
of our young men shield the unsuspect-
ing from the warmth, the glitter, the
light of the saloon.
High license has never killed the traf-
fic in this liquid hell and never will. II
it drops money in the public treasury
with one hand, it takes it out with the
nt he in y,,;c
shameless raids upon the attenuated
purse of the poor victim. It does not
stop the Internal raid upon humanity,
which is filling jails and lunatic asylums
and feeding the gallows. It leaves the
constituencies dealers in strong drink to
pursue their devilish trade. initiating the
young into the vices of which it is the
centre and inspiration; it invents new
and strange devices for perpetuating its
reign, and o"-~~'''"4'"~ its power; ii
throws no shield over the helpless wife.
or the naked. hungry child: il leaves the
State with an accumulated burden OF
lunatics, paupers and assassins.
The wall OF the broken hearted wife in
her rags and the starved child goes up
to Heaven. but no answer comes but
that melted by human faulty, I'VE have
regulated the traffic in immortal souls
by high license" High license with a
vengeance!
Do you want to take a census of your
children in order that you may say, This
child is mine and that one belongs to the
rum seller? II the rum power owns the
State, in Gods name stop tantalizing the
people with your deceptive bills and pc
titions. Let it have its reign of vice in
peace But IL humanity has any rights.
if the family claim can be considered.
let the law assert itself and stamp it out.
1t is regulated in Ohio and Ohio is given
over to rum and beer; it is prohibited
destroyed in Maine, New Hampshire,
Kansas and Iowa. Let us save the COM
ing generation. Boys and men will not
drink until they have been learned to
drink; no man was ever born with an
appetite for liquor save those born of
drunken parents. No natural stomach
ever craved it; it is purely a matter of
education and the rum seller is the teach
er. The drunkard is made-not born.
Regulation by high license ought not to
be thought of by the Legislature If the
liquor traffic is wrong. When you ad-
HilI the necessity IOr regulation you ad-
nit the necessity for prohibition II it
calls for aay interference, it calls fer but
one kind, and that is destruction A
good thing that is abused may be regu-
lated. but bad thing, never. The starry
ing wife does not want high license Let
the saloon go, with its beautiful lights
and pictures. warm in the winter. and
cool in the summer; with its alurements
that are made the more attractive by the
protection of the law. II no other rene
dy appears available. let the applicant for
license be required to file with the coun-
~ board of commissions an application
signed by ree-fourthS of the qualified
voters OF the township who shall say
above their signatures that they are in
favor of the traffic in liquor and do rec
commend the applicant as a proper per-
son to be licensed and let a copy of
this application be posted for four weeks
at the court house door before the Ii
cenSe is granted.
All honor to Senator London for the
bill"
D. WORTHINGTON.