The national prohibitionist. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1907-1911, 1908-04-09
SOUTH CAROLINA'S
DISPENSARY
Items from an Unbiased Study of
Senator Tillman's "Great Moral
Reform Institution"

EDITORS NoTE: For a good many
years great many good people were
fooled by the South Carolina Cor more
properly Mr.. Tillman's) dispensary
system. When it was first established,
it came pretty near to foollng some
Prohibitionists. Later when Prohlbl-
tionists began to uncover the rotten
ness of the institution they were
charged with jealousy, misrepresenta-
ton, unfairness and falsehood Recent
events, the official Investigations and the
criminal prosecutions have told almost
everyone what the real character of the
institution was Mr. Will Irwin, who
is studying the liquor question for COL
Tiers Weekly, has been in South Caro-
lima viewing the wreck, and the follow
ing are some of the paragraphs of his
report in a recent number Of Golfers.
This fragmentary review of facts ought
to remove any last, lingering scrap of
doubt in the mind of anyone as to the
true character of the dispensary, and
leaves Senator Tillman in badly frayed
condition.
South Carolina in 1898 wiped out the
open saloon and replaced the old license
system, which had controlled the liquor
traffS>~ in that state for many years,
by dispensary, modelled on the plan
which has worked wonders in Swe-
den I'M. A year ago South Carolina
gave the coup de grace to her state
dispensary, then an extremely sick and
corrupt institution Since that time the
reformers of the state have been busy
trying to put prominent and once re-
spectacle citizens into Jail for their con-
,,ac+;or, x,it1, itc 6ac1ir1e and fall
The causes for this dismal failure fit
in nicely with that general thesis which
impartial students of the American sa-
loon have evolved In the first place,
the mfemces surrounding retail distrt-
traffic coyvmbts zVhotevey 1T touches. In
the second place, the american alliance
betzveem bad politics and the sale OF
liquor interests" laugh at all lalUs made
for their regulation. Besides the origi-
nal insincerity of its purpose, there was
one great flaw in this South Carolina
experiment. Instead of taking the Ii
quor question out of politics, it tied it
up tight to political ring and this new
method of distribution became evil in
itself and cause of evil in the whole
body polite ..
Whether or no Tillman had in mind
the political convenience of such a law
is still a matter of debate in South
Carolina Certainly it turned out to be
shrewd move for him. The liquor
interests of the state had usually lined
UP with the conservatives. Now, at one
stroke, Tillman killed that opposition.
In its place he set UP machine OF his
own, the lever in his hands, the pro
duct votes and patronage for the Till
man faction. He was virtually its first
director; it was his pet; he used all his
power to get it well started. he went
to Louisville to obtain from branch of
the whisky trust the credit needed to
set it on its feet. For three years he
fought, on the stump in counties that
had the question of local option UP for
decision, to save the dispensary from
its enemies. His state constabulary,
formed to guard and police the institu-