The San Juan islander. [volume] (Friday Harbor, Wash.) 1898-1914, 1904-11-19
PAVORS pRICKING THE BLISTER
To the Editor Of the ISLANDER:

To the Editor Of the ISLANDER:
Under the heading Analysis of Candi-
dates" last week, the ISLANDER, quoting
from Alfred Henry Lewis, says:
"While l loathe gin mills, and have
yet to be taught the public value of dis
til cry, / cannot avoid regarding the Pro-
hibition party as creature moon struck
and wandering. no say that prohibition
is the summum bonum of politics is as if
one should neglect those wounds by
which patient is bleeding to death to
prick blister and call the operation
surgery"
In this country ''those wounds by
which patient is bleeding to DEATH
have been attended to, and no party is
trying to inflict new ones. Now, what is
the objection to ''pricking the blister"
If the operation isn't ''summum'' we can
call it hummum, put let's prick that bis
ter. President Roosevelt says, in effect,
that the Democrats have no policy differ
ent from that of the Republicans; that
they only want the offices, and when they
get them they will do the very things for
which they now condemn the Republic
cans. That accounts for the "landslide."
There was no issue, except the fact that
the Republicans had the more brilliant
candidate. And the difference of 10 cents
worth of good looks has taken us who
had an esthetic sense pell-mell over to
his side, except those who stumbled on
that plague of a blister! Or, is it so broad
and deep that pricking it will make the
whole ''summum'' of the patient run
out? Well, it has doubled itself in size
every twenty-three years for some time
and last year it cost us more than all the
grains of all kinds produced in this coun-
try to get ointment to put on it. And it
is fouler than it is big-look at it:
"Judge Quinn, of the 18th judicial dis
trict, Minnesota, recently said that 81 per
cent of crime was due, directly or indi-
rectly, to drink"
"Sheriff Johnson, of st. Joseph county,
Indiana, says that he kept an accurate
account Of the causes for arrest of every
one of more than 5000 cases that came un-
der his care during his four years as
wife went over them and found that 954
per cent were directly traceable to IL
quOr."
''The prison warden at Pittsbu1g, Pa,
reports that of 1879 summary convictions
during 1902 nearly everyone was treated
for alcoholism, while of this number 700
suffered from acute delirium tremens."
1.-THE report of the warden of the ALLIE
gheny county, Pa, prison board for 1900
showed that during the year there were
received 9,182 prisoners as against $40
the previous year. The Jail physicion
stated that 95 per cent of those committed
were out under his care for alcoholism,
and of 5,727 who were summarily con-
victed there was not one who was not
victim of the alcohol habit
sin 1896 Commissioners Wadlin. of
Massachusetts, was instructed to report
to the legislature as to the relation of the
liquor traffic to crime, pauperism and in
sanity. He reported that of adults 96 per
cent of the criminals. IS per cent of the
paupers and 81 per cent of the insane
were so because of the liquor traffic." In
Massachusetts, it costs the counties and
the state five times as much to take cal
of the victims of drink as the license fees
amount to.
Temperance people are about as numer-
Gus as others, and it ought not to be noe
essary for them to be either moonstruck
or munmy-struck. Ifbleeding wounds"
were one-half as deadly as this craving
for drink can be pointed out, no doubt
Prohibitionists will help to dress them.
Then will you help to prick the Bills
teri" All wag the tongue. That will
scatter the moonshine so that no one will
get moonstruck.
ASAEL LARSON.
Friday Harbor, Nov. Is.