The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-11-16

ting Down the Poppy Farms
China's Ten Million Opium Smok-
ers, and How They Compare With
the Whiskey Drinkers of the West.
Copyright, 1909, by Frank G.. Car
penter.)
Suppose that President Taft and
our national Congress should send out
an edict tomorrow that every man
and woman in the employ of the gov
nme must give up the drinking
of liquor or be dismissed from Office,
and that no new appointment should
be made to any one who had con-
tracted the liquor habit or who would
not sign the pledge. Let this edict
relate not only to Washington, but
to every p~ostofice and custom house,
include every state official, even to
the county clerks, sheriffs, and their
subordinate employees.
Let another edict provide that all
must show government permits be-
fore q glass of whisky. wine or other
liquor will be sold to them, and so
that every Saloon-keeper be subject
to fine n Imprisonment if he breaks
this law. Let the edict summarily
shut nine-tenths of the saloons, and
provide for the absolute destruction
of all within the course of ten years.
Let there be laws forbidding the dis
filling of liquors and their importa-
ton; and, in short, the Inauguration
of a scheme of government restric-
tons which would entirely wipe out
the manufacture, selling and drink
ing of anything intoxicating within
the space Of ten years.
1t would be a good, big contract,
would it not?
Well, tina is Just what China is
trying to do IS blotting opium n
the opium traffic from the face Of
her country.
The Anti-Opium Edicts.
We have had crusadeS against Ii
uuor, but they ave been mostly be-
gun by the women and carried out
with the opposition, rather than the
assistance, of the government officials.
This crusade of China begins at the
top. Three years ago the great en-
press doWager and the chief boards Of
the empire at Picking sent out edicts
cutting down the size Of the opium
and requiring all dealers IN opium
to take out licenses. The government
commanded all farmers to reduce
their opium fields by 10 per cent
every yea and provided that 10
opium at all should be cultivated after
the merchants decrease their opium
sales 20 per cent eevry ear and
close out their whole business in the
space Of five years. 1t ordered that
all public opium dens should be sum-
marily closed, and that the retail
opium shops should gradually be abol-
ished. At the same time it inaugu-
rated d~isensaries where free medi-
cines might be had to tax away the
opium craving, n encouraged the
establishment of opium hospitals for
those who had contracted the habit.
In the same edicts it was provided
that all users of opium should be reg
istered; that they should be exam
ined by the police, and h habitual
users should be allowed only a given
quantity Of the drug, at certain fixed
periods. Thes allowances were to
be gradually reduced so that at the
end of five years all persons under
the habit. All users of opium were
required to wear badges, SO that every
one would know an opium hend as
he walked through the streets.
All government officials, including
princes, dukes, viceroys and generals
under sixty, had six months to give
up the habit or to tender their resig-
nations; and all teachers and schol-
airs were required to stop opium
smoking within the space of n year.
AS to the officers of the army and
navy, they were commanded to aban-
con the habit at once
This is What China is trying to 90.
The above proclaamtions have been
Followed by others, and today the
prince regent and the grand councll
are doing all they can to have these
laws put into force. They are prose
cutting their infringement, and they
nave inaugurated such a reign OF ter
ror as would create a revolution IN
The United States and turn our peopls
aid government upside down.
Officials Made to Stop Smoking.
1t makes one laugh to think what
would happen if Uncle Sam should
cut OF every congressman's today,
7hcui4 prohibit cold tea in the res
LdUrant Of tho Co-oto or1 not allow