Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1906-05-16
WALHALLA, q. T.. 3
wkDNKsDAv. MAY 10, 1909.
WON'T USE DlsPeNsARY FUNDS.

The prejudice against the dispensary
funds, ss means of supporting the pub
lie schools, is still growing. 1t seems to
have reached the highest point in the
Willis school district in Marlboro county.
We make the following extracts from a
BETTER written on May Sd, TO the Superin-
tendent of Education of that county:
"At the meeting of the patrons of Will
His school this afternoon it was unani-
mously decided to refrain from the use
of dispensary funds in our school district
80 long as sufficient amount is raised
nm the district to keep the school open as
long as it would be kept open in case the
dispensary funds were used.
at seers that there was never divi-
sion among us as to the righteousness of
-efraining from the use of the dispensary
funds, but only difference of opinion as
to whether we had the power to do so or
not. We are agreed that so long as these
funds are appropriated to our district
we must either use them or raise among
ourselves an equal amount for school
purposes. 1t has been suggested that
we allow the dispensary funds to &C
cumulate to our credit until the death of
the dispensary and then use them to
build a monument on our school gror IDS
ito tho deceased Such disposition of
'the funds, in the opinion of the trustees,
would be to the best interest of the
school district
"Our strongest opposition centers on
v5he profit feature of the dispensary. We
Mold that II whiskey selling is a legiti-
mate business the State has no righ. to
nonopolize it. If in the exercise of her
police powers she seeks to control it as
an evil, no profit should be made out of
it. AS Jon as the thing becomes profit.
able it becomes business. We are
aware that it is claimed the profit fea-
ture is only an incident but it is not a
necessary incident. The dispensary
could be run so as to yield no profit. BY
a parity of reasoning gambling and the
social ovil' could be monopolized, legal
lied, and rendered profitable by the
State; and perhaps at some future day,
funds derived from such source may be
apportioned to the various school dis
tricts' and put upon parity with the
:3mill tax, the trustees being required
under threat of removal to treat them all
alike"
This is the strongest protest sent in
ssince the establishment of the dispen.
,sary. Many schools and many individu-
ais have protested against the use of
money derived from the profits on the
sale of liquors, but the Willis school
trustees are the first, so far as we recall,
to positively thrust aside the States
i'blood money" aud offer to raise an
equal sum from among the patrons of
the school The dispensary is rapidly
sinking out of public favor, and though
not yet dead, it is damned and doomed"
and the end seems to be almost in sight.
And it is we'll. An institution capable
of as much corruption and rot as has
been developed in the dispensaries of this
State deserves no better fate than death
from the stencil of it's own putrfactOn.
We cannot agree with the Willis school
rSrustees, however, AZ to the final use of
the money that accumulates to their
credit from the dispensary funds Let
chem, rather than erect a monument to
the deceased seek TO forgive those who
Shfust the institution on us and forget
Etlat we were ever damned by it.