The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1907-06-20


cation who may be playing with the
deadly monster. strong drink. End That
may, with Gods help, have some part
IN arousing public sentiment that has
for, alas too long, been dormant with
reference to this evil that has grown up
and has so strongly entrenched itself in
this and other parts of this county, so
that evils directly traceable to this cause
are too often regarded as a matter of
course, or condoned and excused by an
over indulgent populace. Truly has it
been said
''Sin is monster of such hideous mein,
That to be hated needs only to be seen;
But seen too oft we become familiar with
it's face;
We first endure, then pity, then embrace"
Is it not fact that is patent to every
casual observer that all over this
county there are to be found young men
and older men-yea even boys, and l
blush to say it, and women who do not
hesitate to press to their lips the fatal
glass that has charged to its account
more assaults, more thefts, more in
costs, more fratricides, more homicidts
than all other sources of evil combined;
and, furthermore, this accursed demon,
1t has been already proven, is chargea-
bic with being the direct cause of more
ignorance, more idiocy, more imbeciIity,
more lunacy, more poverty, more dis
ease, more, indeed, of everything that
is devilish and degrading than is everv
other source of evil which is known to
man.
Young men, young women, tonight
could | get you to see as it seems to me
every thoughtful person should see the
poisonous serpent that turks in every
glass of liquor you would, l am persua-
ded, dash forever from your hand the
glass containing that which the wise
and inspired prophet refers to when he
says: Strong drink shall be bitter to
them that drink it. ="
This accursed business sometimes, all
unwittingly, points to its own shame.
Recently over an advertisement carried
by one of the saloon keepers of this
town was the caption Murder, Muir
der, d" and whether this .was ominous or
not | am not prepared to say, but the
facts are, as many of you know, that
that den of iniquity has been closed IN
der the sheriff's hammer And when
few days since saw in the show win
dow of another saloon of this town,
whose glazing and brazen impudence
and presence on the most prominent
business street of the county seat of
this county is an insult to decency, |
say when | saw there, coiled in that
window, and surrounded by lavish dis
play of the internal liquid that is dis
pensed from within that place, three
poisonous, deadly rattlesnakes, it was
to me as though l stood in the presence
of the lofty minded prophet who is the
author of my text, and heard him say
The way Is so plain the Wayfaring men
though fools need not err therein" Or,
/ could close my eyes and in my imagi-
nation | could see the wise man Solo
mon stand before that window and in
all solemnity point to that living and
real illustration of the results of liquor
and say as he said of it almost three
thousand years ago: ''At the last it
biteth like serpent and stingeth like
an adder" am certain that this, too,
was an ominous sign-betokening that
poison, and hate, and venom awaited
every partaker of the distilled damna-
ton from within.
Had John Brown and Truman Root
learned long ago the lesson that labor
tonight to impress upon you, the wife
of Truman Root need not to have been
a widow, his children need not to be
fatherless with the heritage handed
down to them and shadowing their lives
that their father had died in such
shameful surroundings. Had they learn
ed as you may this lesson John Brown
| lilolSod VI DelIlS d COINlCl anu lang ulST-
ing tonight in a convict's cell, might
have been at his own fireside to cheer
the heart Of her whom he vowed at the
matrimonial altar he would protect and
defend as long as they both should live
But alas alas they learned not this
lesson and consequently marriage vows
have been broken, wives have been
widowed and worse than widowed chill
dren have been disgraced and rendered
fatherless, and an overindulgent COM
munity has been shocked, and shamed,
and outraged. Garrett county has had
one more dark crime added to the
already too long list of criminal acts
traceable to its foolish custom of au-
thorizing the sale of alcoholic beverages.
return now, in closing, to the ques-
ton that has been the all-absorbing
question during these recent days !:
"Who killed Truman Root" The find
ing of the court of inquiry was that
John Brown, a neighbor of Truman
Root, a man who came with him to this