The star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1908-1909, 1908-03-16

Clement j. Driscoll, of New York.
president of the East Side Pure Milk
League. and author of the New YorK
ant-cocaine bill passed by the New
York Legislature, came to Trenton to
give his opinion on the need for the
bill and the bill itself. From Essex
County We're Sheriff Frank III. Sommer,
the Rev. E. A. Wasson, rector of st.
Stephens Episcopal Church, Of New
ark; Mrs. Maurice s. Decker, president
of the Political Study Club, of Orange:
DR.. Edward J. Ill, of Newark, and
William j. McKeirnan, head of several
boys clubs in that city, were on hand
to inform the committee of the neces-
sity for action on the part of the LegIs-
latuTe in this direction, bringing homo
their points with stories of their own
experience in trying to reform victims
of the drug. The Rev. T. Arid Moffatt.
of the First Congregational Church.
was one of the strongest ADVOCATES OF
the passage of the bill.
ParegOric Under the Han.
Considerable opposition to the meas
ure came from the drug associations of
the State, who saw their trade in
patent medicines containing opium and
other narcotics expressly prohibited III
the bill disappearing. Most of the OBJ
Jection was based on the contention
that paregoric came under the head OF
opium or its derivatives
No mention was made of the fact
that there are cases on record where
paregoric has created an appetite for
opium that has been as disastrous to
the victim as if the pure drug were
used. nor the fact that should the bill
go through it would be decidedly more
difficult for careless parents and nurse
maids to give children unauthorized
doses of the stuff, possibly injuring
them for life.
Mr.. DriscolI in his talk drew a vivid
picture of the horrors resulting fronl
! the Illicit use of cocaine.
"The first dose OF cocaine is the very
hand of death itself. and its grip
stronger than steel; it's use is always
rewarded by insanity or DEATH" he
said
Children in Its Grasp.
Some months ago the Rev. Father
! Curry OF New York, came to me and
asked my aid in suppressing this vice.
An investigation was immediately
/ started. We were approached by hun
/ drCds of heart-broken mothers, who
/ sought our aid In saving the life OF
some dear son or daughter who was q
| victim OF the drug.
/ 1--WE discovered druggists IN great
numbers who made it "a business to sell
/ this drug TO the unrortunafes, and
| found, too. that the drug had in its
grasp thousands upon thousands OF llt-
/ tic children.
"The first dose the victim takes Is
/ highly exhilarating. but the reaction
+ is horrible 1t is death and darkness
ITSELF a dying cocaine fend said to me.
1 When his fit of depression strikes the
i fiend he must have more cocaine He
4 becomes unfit for work and conse-
+ quently he must stea..
"When you read in the paper Of the
wealthy man or woman shoplifting,
and his or her relatives cannot accoui,t
for the stealing because of the wealth
the police tell you that it is kleptoma-
mia; the truth is that he or she Is
cocaine hend.
Druggist pays penalty.
"No more pitiable sight could have
been witnessed than by standing out
side of Charles Hiteh's drug store at
Mott street. New York. between the
hours of / and in the morning. and
see there the long line of depraved
cocaine fieuds waiting TO buy their
'coke'-tnen, women and children. The
druggist was the king Of cocaine sellers
in New York He ignored our appeals
to save the youth. He abused our
agents who warned him and defied us
/ when we threatened his arrest. Thanks
+ be 10 God this druggist IS now ~
state prison serving his term ot i'm
4 prisonment upon being sentenced after
our arresting him for selling this drug
in violation Of our new law
TN our months and months Of neyer-