The Kemper herald. (Scooba, Miss.) 1875-1908, 1905-03-02

day the proprietor of the place and the
owner of the building, with one of the
aldermen, rushed into my Office. The
owner of the building appeared to be
the most excited of the group. He took
me aside and told me there must have
been some mistake, that the saloon
keeper kept a reputable place, and then
he added:
81 put up $500 for your campaign
fund, and now you are taking $500 a
year from my income"
do you mean to tell me-" | replied,
that you get a rental of $500 a year
for a 50-foot BASEMENT"
TITS worth It," he retcrted with some
heat. II have been offered more than
that, but the present lessee has been
there for some years. He gives me no
trouble, and this is the first time he
has had trouble with the police. You
know you cannot control people in sa-
looms, and he tells me that the man
who was robbed brought the woman to
the saloon"
That's just it," l said. your ten
ant allows women to frequent his
place." and l handed him the police re-
port of the robbery.
He showed it to the saloonkeeper,
who declared that the police had it
in" for him, but did not deny the
charge. Finally the owner of the build
ing, the alderman and the saloonkeeper
promised me that no. more women
would be allowed in the place and I
gave the saloonkeeper written permits
sion to reopen.
l have cited these two incidents to
call attention to the curious moral as
tigmatism with which some of the
prominent business men of large cities
are afflicted.
These men unquestionably were pub
lic-spirited citizens. Their regulations
were stainless. They stood for all that
was honest and sound in the CONNER
cial world, but when it came to dam
ming up one or more of the streams of
revenue which flowed to their reser-
voirs they became aggressive defenders
of saloons and champions of the social
evil. Any man who has served as
mayor of any large American city will
bear me out in the statement that n
of the greatest obstacles in the way of
a cleaning out of public evils has been
the open or secret opposition of men
who owned property which was rented
to the keepers of low saloons or disor-
derby houses.
This condition was brought to my at
tention through the inspection by the
health department of a district which
formed the zone of transition that in
dicates that the business center is
pushing its way out into the residence
district. 1t is in such localities that
houses of i'll repute frequently are
found. The buildings are of the ram
shackle kind. permitted by their own
ers to run down because they soon will
be pulled down. In the particular ter
ritory inspected by the sanitary force
were a number of disorderly houses,
and all of them were reported to be in
such poor sanitary condition that the
report carried a recommendation to
condemn them. This meant, practi-
cally, to pull them down.
There were so many such buildings
that I hesitated about approving the
recommendation and ordered the police
department to secure me information
giving the names Of the owners of the
houses, the condition Of the buildings,
the character of the tenants, and, if
possible, the annual rentals paid by the
iessees. That report made me place
an exceedingly low valuation on the
real moral character of some of the
best" people of my city. Their names
appeared opposite street numbers
which Indicated the location of the
worst type of d~isorderly houses. But
the rent roll of the district showed
where the business instinct had got the
better Of moral scruples. Thus:
sThree-story frame, seven inmates,
SIS a week.
Brick cottage, five rooms, three In
mates, $45 q week.
"Two-story, English basement frame,
rented by ~, $50 q week
And this rent was collected each
Monday afternoon by agents who did
not hesitate to threaten that the places
would % pulled II the rent was not
forthcoming.
10 ae6nts II III sevsrai pieces IL