The wageworker. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1904-????, 1908-09-05
HOW TO FIGHT BOOZE.
Prehibitionists Ignore Real Cause of
Men Giving Way to Drink

Men Giving Way to Drink
The agitation all over the country
tending to prohibit the sale of in
toxics.ting liquors is capturing many
communities for the "drys- Aside
from the remedy of removing the
temptation to drink 10 excess by re-
moving the drink, let us for a while
consider the cause of excessive drink
ing of alcoholic spirits, and if we
agree upon the causes their removal
may bring about permanently that de-
Vrea of temperance in the use of
alcoholics so much to be desired.
1t is an accepted truism that ones
material condition has great bearing
on ones moral state Low wages,
long workdays at monotonous toll,
hard bodily labor under the eyes of
a boss, have a depressing effect upon
the mind and ambition of the man
thus situated His absolute depend
ence upon the within of the overseer
for the bare living of himself and his
family bears heavily upon him. He
sees in the future no CLEAN of hope
that his lot in life will be better:
nothing before his vision but weary
repetition, day by day, of grinding
labor for beggarly wages He sees
up the toll, deprived of the schooling
through which he had hoped to make
their lives happier than his had been,
and his wife. weary. and haggard,
stumbles along with him in a home
environment of squalor and poverty.
Who knows to what extent the
bleak WEAKNESS of this mans life
plunges him into detection and
prompts him to seek the temporary
cheer of alcoholic stimulants? Who
knows how long and how hard he has
resisted the temptation-to succumb
at last in utter hopelessness to the
beverage which helps him to forget?
1t does not answer the question to
say that this man could least afford
to spend any part of his small wages
upon drink. He is not a philosopher,
but few men are when the case is
brought home to themselves. He has
struggled against the odds until he
has lost that one quality which keeps
all men from dependency, hope. when
he loses the rudder of ambition and
drifts upon the sea of periodic drunk
enness. AS long as there is stimu-
lating drug made this man will find it.
| The chief causes of the excessive
drinking of alcoholic stimulants
among the masses are low wages and
long workdays. As the environment
of the home is made wholesome and
happy through the material prosperity
of the husband and father receiving
fair wages for an eight-hour workday
so to corresponding degree will
morality and temperance pervade the
home atmosphere
The material condition of the people
IS the basis upon which their moral
condition must rest
1t is the function of organized labor
to better the material condition of the
people, by raising wages. shortening
the workday, abolishing child labor
and the sweatshop: and it seeks the
cooperation of every preacher and
advocate of temperance, to the enc
that the causes which make drunkard:
of men shall be permanently removed
The progress of the trade unioI
movement will mark the coming o
temperance among the working PEG
pie in the use of the intoxicants
Without the aid of organized labo
the work of the prohibitionists viii
be of no permanent avail.-Sho'
Workers Journal.