The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-09-05
CLEMENs is WAyERING.
Says he Has Notion to Become q
Prohibitionist.

To the Editor of the State Journal:
have about made I'D my mind to
reform, like Dick Hayden and ats
Hungate. and become good Prohibi-
zionist. 1t pays much better. by
whole hot. Neither Hayden nor Hun
gate ever got as much for defending
the brethren as they get now in sal
aries, sure to be paid on exact time, Tor
prosecuting them. They get excellent
pay for seeking it to the druggists, and,
according to the prohibitionists at least,
not so far disputed by the other crowd,
they have the firm friendship OF the
votes to keep the good salaries going
for two years longer when the first
term of fortunes shall have expired.
fail to see why I should not accept
good pay, too. for going after the vend-
ers of Carrie Nation ''hell-broth" and
expect to be considered a rafting good
fellow by the dealers in the wicked
truck. I think shall accept re-
tainer to close all the joints and then
ask the votes Of the jointists next year
to make me county attorney or probate
judge. They are a forgiving set of
roosters and would doubtless boost me
met to out-Herod old man Herod
against them. Certainly. no rabid Pro-
hibtt.Onist could have gone farther in
blind zeal than County Attorney Hun
gate and Judge Hayden went this very
day. not to speak of other days, in re-
fusing permit to a druggist. 1 shall
not argue the case in the newspapers.
1 shall only ask if any business man
would like to be ordered to produce his
books in court and give the public exact
| information as to all his private affairs
| in order to get license to carry on
his business. That is precisely what
the county attorney and the probate
judge did this blessed day to an appli-
cant for druggists permit. The man
who bought out another swore he had
done so. and the man who sold swore
1 ho he I,oI l.
longer cents worth of interest in the
concern. After such a swear could he
have made any claim to the property
even had it been a valuable gold mine?
Yet the permit was refused on the sole
ground thai the applicant was not the
proprietor" of the stock!
| The county attorney tried the matter
as II 1t were case of Judgment
made to defraud him. do not say the
probate judge was wrong. Heaven for
bid! At my time of life a lawyer of
discretion goes out behind the barn and
whispers when he wishes to say that
judge has decided wrong. 1t is I'M
doubtedly the law, therefore, that when
business man asks for a license to do
business he must hire an express wagon
and haul all his account books, re-
turned checks, invoices and his bank
book to the court and let the reporters
tell a yearning public whether he had
seven dollars and half to his credit
draft of six dollars and seventy-five
cents with which to pay seventeen thou
sand dollars of bills and accounts pay
able. This sort of proceeding Will UNI
dOubtedly have a tendency to help his
credit in case he should be graciously
permitted to do business. and must do
him all kinds of good if permission
should should be refused him. I do not
question the strict legality nor the
| boundless generosity of this require
ment. All I say is that the most strin-
had overlooked this particular instru-
ment of justice, and that a man con-
| demned by the Prohibitionists-a man
on account of whose wicked appoint
ment the Almighty flooded North To-
! peka and drowned even little children
| is the first to make use of it.
think shall reform like Richard and
| Otis and go after the people who dis
pense unlawful booze. I can get more
| they get their pay in salaries, but why
cannot 1 make similar arrangement?
l shall think it over carefully. If / do
reform, as they have reformed, there
| there will be something doing pretty
soon in this pious community.
1 admit that I am hot at present.
When I saw even the cashier OF bank
called today to lay bare a business
mans affairs simply because he had
been so audacious as to ask permission
| to carry on a lawful business, 1 think
every lawyer and business man will
agree that I had right to get warm.
| But warm or not. what 1 have said
about reforming seems to me to have
some sense in it. / shall think over it
| tonight.
Sept. 4, 1903. G. c. CLEMENS.