Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1905-06-28
AGAIN THE DlspEksARY QUESTION.
Hon. B. r. crayt0n, Of Anderson, Discusses
II from Various SiandpoInts.
Anderson Mail, June 81. ]

make no pretense of observing the
requirements as to signing the re-
quest blanks for liquor, and a man
can buy as often in one day as he
feels like it. The local dispensers,
instead of trying to restrict the sale
of liquor, are always glad to sell to
anybody who wants to buy. The
failure of the dispensers to carry out
either the present letter or the
original spirit of the dispensary law
is known to all men, either of direct
knowledge or by heresay, and yet no
effort is ever made to have them
carry out the law. There is explicit
provision in the law by which they
may be punished for violating the
law, yet nobody has ever expressed a
desire to have them punished.
Now, why do not the dispensers
carry out the law? Simply because
the people do not want them to
carry it out-because the public is
content with conditions as shey are.
And if the public is not demanding
the enforcement of the present law,
which is easy enough even when car
ried out to the letter, will the public
make an effort to enforce another
law ten times more rigid
The present anti-dispensary agita-
tion, as we understand it, is not 80
much against the dispensary law as
it was originally given US, and as it
stands on the statute books to-day,
as against the State dispensary in
Columbia and its management and
the odor that surrounds it. The
public is satisfied that there is some
thing wrong down there-that there
is mismanagement if nothing worse
and the repeated failure of the Leg
islature to straighten matters out
has convinced great many people
that the only way to purify it is to
get rid of it.
The people believe that if the To-
cal dispensers run their establish.
ments solely with view of increas-
ing sales they are acting under in
structions from headquarters, and
that somebody, somewhere, must be
interested in increasing the sales of
whiskey through the dispensaries.
When the dispensary law was en-
acted we were told that it was po-
lice regulation, that it would decrease
the use of whiskey among the peo-
pie, and would be step toward pro-
hibition. 1t has not proven to be
anything of the kind. The dispen.
sary has, if anything, increased,
rather than decreased the sales of
whiskey, and we will give the figures
to prove it.
The three dispensaries in this
county now sell in year whiskey of
various kinds to the amount of about
100000.
The last year of the old bar room
system in Anderson there were seven
bar rooms. Last week we asked S.
T. Craig, who was in the business
then, and who is a man in whom
everybody has confidence, what
would be his estimate of the average
sales of each of the saloons in An
derson the last year of their exist
ence. Mr.. Craig, after some thought,
said he thought an average of $25
a day all the year round for each of
the saloons would be very liberal
estimate. This estimate may not be
absolutely correct, but we believe it
is not very far from wrong. And If
each bar room sold on an average of
$25 worth of goods day, that would
amount to $4,000 for the seven in a
year.
Our population has greatly in
creased since the old bar room days,
but even allowing for the increase in
itappears that the dispen-
saries are selling as much whiskey
per capita as the bar rooms sold. 1t
may even appear that they are sell
ing more. Certainly no man can de-
fend the dispensary as Temperance
measure" or as "step toward pro-