The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-10-25

In order that this pretext may be used i no longer to mislead the people l VIII l quote both the Bessemer ordinance and
 section of the amendment. In this con l neetion it is to be noted that Judge Weak l ley admits the authorship of the amend
 ment, and it has been stated that he IS
 also the author of the Bessemer ordi-
 nance. At all events, the terms of the
 Bessemer ordinance were before him i when the amendment was written, as he 1 is one of the attorneys of record for the ] city of Bessemer in the application now
 pending for a rehearing in that case. Sec
 ton 1 of the Bessemer ordinance as re- i ported by the decision of the supreme ] court contains a clerical error but it's
 meaning is perfectly manifest. l quote
 1t as follows.
 "Be it ordained by the city council of i Bessemer as follows:
 ] That 1t shall be unlawful and consti-
 ute a violation of this ordinance if any
 person, firm oi corporation in the city of
 Bessemer to have or keep on storage OF
 deposit or have therein any wines spirit
 uous or malt liquors or intoxicating bev-
 erages or any beverag ges which is the
 product of maltace or gencsse is a sub
 stantial ingredient, in or at any place
 where any drinks or beverages are sold
 or kept for sale"
 now quote section ? of the proposed
 amendment:
 "Nothins in this constitution shall be construed to prevent the legislature. un- der the police power. from designating
 places where such liquors may not be stored or kept"
 It would take an intellect with more as- tuteness than that of a Philadelphia law yer to seriously maintain the proposition that the amendment was merely intended to meet the case provided for by the Bes-
 semer ordinance. If this was its sole
 purpose, as has been confidently and fre- quently asserted, why may I not ask
 were not the words "city of Bessemer''
 stricken out of that ordinance and "the
 state of Alabama" Inserted, and the ordi
 nance itself presented for our consider
 ation?
 Judge Weakley in an endeavor to recon
 cile section of the amendment with the
 section quoted from the Bessemer ordi- nance treated the Bessemer ordinance as
 if 1t related only to soft drinks. He says
 that if the amendment had been proposed
 in that form there would not be a soft
 drink stand anywhere in Alabama, but they all would be hard drink stands But
 the difficulty with this explanation Is that neither soft drinks nos hard drinks are mentioned in the Bessemer ordinance but
 the same relates to "any drinks or bever- ages" If the purpose of this section was merely to meet the supposed evil resulting from the decision in the Bess~ner case,
 no language could possibly have been
 used so inapt or inappropriate to that end.
 But Mir. Faith insists that section ? of the proposed amendment provides merely
 for the 'regula ton of places where 1t
 may be kept. This argument is far more ingenious than sound. There is nothing
 al lafi m in fe prohibition and not regulation that Is
 found therein. The legislature shall not have the power to regulate" the places
 where liquors may or may not be stored
 or kept, but its power Is to designate the places where they may not be stored
 or kept" It Is just as competent for
 the legislature under this section to des- ignate the home as place wh gre liquors may not be stored or kept as 1t is to des-
 ignate a store or an offi~e or a club. One
 of these places is as well within the ex-
 press terms of the section as the other,
 and no sort of ingenuity or sophistry can
 evade or obscure the proposition.
 It has been argued as the excuse for the adoption of the amendment that the leg islature in the future could not be trusted | to maintain the prohibition policy in force. It is for this very reason that we oppose section of the proposed amendment. In
 
 done. who can say what another legisa- ture may not do? When has the spirit of fanaticfsm once infiamed ever been sat isfied? And it must be remembered that
 the present legislature does not expire until 1911 and the governor is a great be- liever in extra sessions.
 As a final argument, 1t Is claimed that the right of the citizen to keep liquor
 in his home is protected by the inter OIa af a constitution. There are two answers to this suggestion. In the first place. the interstate commerce clause of the federal constitution does not apply after the liquor has been received in l, the state and delivered. When this | occurs, the police power of the state attaches and the federal constitution
 disappears. All that is provided py l the interstate commerce clause Is the | right to ship from one state 10 an- | other. and even that right Is proposed to be taken away, not, 1t is true by | the act of the legislature, but by the act of Congress, which has express | Jurisdiction over the subject
 MT. Faith well knows, as does every other man Of intelligence in the state, | that pr. w B. Crumpton, the president of the Anti-Saloon league of Alabama, addressed letter to the voters of the Second congressional district urging them to support William Fl. Sanford for Congress and to defeat s. H. Dent, IT,. upon the sole ground that Sam ford favored while Dent opposed the passage of the bill by Congress to pro hibit the shipping of any liquor from states where 1t was lawful to manu- facture 1t, into states where 1t was un- lawful to sell it. And 1t is further true that the Anti-Saloon league of America constantly maintains an of flee and paid lobby in Washington, D. c. whose duty 1t is. and who are ac- lively discharging that duty, to pro- mote the passage of the bill to pro- hibit the shipping of any kind Of liouors from states which permit it's manufacture into states which prohibit it's sale The proposition has the for midable support of the Antf-Saloon league of Alabama, of which, as all ready stated, Dr. Crumpton is the pres ident and MT. Lawrence is the super intendent, and Judge Weakley the gen
 eral counsel. Judge Weakley drew the Carmichael bill and he made 1t as broad as the English language would permit. Not drop can be made for any purpose within this state, nor can a drop be shipped into this state If the
 remainder of the programme is carried into effect. Thus tho circuit is made complete. The provision, therefore, pre- tending to permit tho social serving of lfouors and beverages in private residences reminds me of the struggle inc man had who was endeavoring to reconcile the doctrines of free will and nredestination, who solved the riddle thus: