The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-07-13
A SATURDAY SERMON.
.REFORMING" TIE SALOON.

REFORMING'' THE SALOON.
Can the Ethiopian change his skin. or
DO good that are accustomed to do evil
Jeremiah 1923. 7s-ssr~s-f
After trying it for eighteen months
at a cost of several hundred thousand
dollars, the brewers of Texas have
given up as a bad job the reformation
of the saloon. They have been trying
to make the saloon decent and moral,
but the very nature of the saloons
goods rendered the task impossible.
The sentiment against the saloon has
grown very rapidly in Texas for sew
eral years. County after county ban
ished it until the brewers became
frightened for fear the whole state
would "go prohibition So the Texas
Brewers association began to cast
about for way to stop the growth of
the anti-saloon sentiment.
Now, as everyone knows, the trou-
BILE with the saloon is its lawlessness
and immorality-its disposition ito
breed trouble in the shape of quarrels,
and murders. and broken hearts. and
ruined homes. and lost souls. There
fore the brewers association hit on
the plan of having only nice, moral
saloons that would be perfectly order
store. Then, they argued. there could
be no more objection to the saloon and
the progress of prohibition would
stop.
To secure this result the brewers
adopted the plan of taxing themselves
twenty cents for each keg of beer
which they manufactured and sold in
Texas. OF course they added this tax
to the price of the beer on the theory
that the saloonkeepers ought to pay
for their own reformation; and the
saloonkeepers passed the expense on
to their customers by decreasing the
size of the schooners. so that it had tn e
doubly beneficial effect of raising a
fund for commendable purpose and
also decreasing the amount of beer
consumed.
This tax is said to have created a
fund of about 100000 since it was
established, and this fund has been
utilized by the brewers to put the law
breaking saloons out of business. They
hired detectives and attorneys and
prosecuted saloonkeepers who ran
wine rooms or gambling dens in con-
nection with their saloons, or who sold
liquor to minors or women, or did any
thing else Illegal. The notorious dives
were run out of business and only nice,
moral saloons were supposed to exist.
Now it is announced that the plan
has not worked as we'll as was antici-
pated and the brewers association has
given it up. Some way or other the
saloon business wouldn't stay reform
ed. The saloons continued to manu-
facture drunkards. The s. harvest of
and suicides and ruined lives
has continued-and. worst of all from
the brewers standpoint, thirty addi- |
tionaI Texas counties have gone dry
/ The reason for the failure is not |
hard to find. Reforming the saloon is |
like trying to pump the ocean dry. |
The very nature of the saloons bust |
ness makes it impossible. Intoxica ting |
drink produces a demoralizing effect |
the same as does opium and cocaine
and similar drugs, though perhaps not t
in the same degree. A harmless CO.
caine parlor is the same sort of a
paradox as a moral saloon. Liquor
enslaves and degrades it's victims. and
naturally. accompanies
drinking. Then. too. the man who is
mean and low enough to traffic in the |
drinkers appetite and thirst, selling
him that which steals his manhood,
wrecks his health and kills his soul
such a man can not be moral or he
would not engage in such a business
There may be limits to his immortality, |
and some saloonkeepers may be worse
han others; but no individual who
cares so little for his fellowman that
he will degrade him in order to make
4 little profit, can lay claim to decency |
and uprightness.
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