The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-09-17
As One Preacher Thinks of staIlIngs

As One Preacher Thinks of StaIIlngs. To the Editor of The Age-Herald:
 In your report of the anti-amendment meeting Monday night I note what Mr stallings has to say about political par sons" He may have seen some of that class of people-I don't know any. The question of prohibition is one in which all good citizens take interest. Preachers are citizens. and have not surrendered their citizen rights in any sense. They see more of the evils of the whisky traffic than perhaps any other class of men save our sheriffs and judges. No "cheap class" or any other class of preachers want "cy- ic government turned over to them" The preachers very seldom ask for any of- flee. We think we have an office su- perior to any that human beings can be- stow. But MT. Stallings and his crowd will find they have the most tremendous task and the most stupendous fight they ever realized when they go to whipping preachers" By the way. he is quoting from Roger Q. Mills, when that disap- pointed lawyer undertook to force Bishop Galloway and many preachers in Texas some years past to quit fighting the H. censed liquor traffic. How the ex-United
 
 defeat, and how Bishop Galloway sue ceeded and was crowned victor are mat ters of history upon which MT. Stallings might ponder with profit, if he ever pom ders. But MT. Stallings in his zeal against the preachers suggests that the effective way to whip preachers who are active in advocacy of constitutional prohibition is to "cut off their quarters" Remove the fire from the boiler and see what AaF-r +0r T+ perhaps be wicked in me to suggest that the maximum sum of a Quarter Is what he has been paying to his preacher, so I will desist. But when he states that if the preachers Quarter" is withheld he will be muzzled and afraid he mani- fests motive and spirit unworthy a man who has the experience Mir. S. has. The writer does not believe there Ae many preachers in Alabama who are preaching for "quarters" with which MT. S. seems so familiar I know hundreds of them who can make dollars at something else, to where they get ''quarters" for preaching The writer has for his advocacy of pro- hibition' several times in the past been moved from good paying places to where the salary was four-fiftlfs less, and the boiler kept on generating steam with which to run over all the saloons In sight until today there is not a legal one in Alabama-much as Mir s. may regret 1t. But the laymen who believe in prohibition are those who pay dolars-not quar- ters"-to their pastors now. They do it because they see as the preachers see, and are in hearty sympathy with this great heayen-sent movement. Let MT. Stallings beware, before he gets too zeal ous against preachers. They have multi tudes of friends. I see it alleged that the whisky men have large sums of money to spend in Alabama, and think they ought by all means to hire Mir Stallings to make this noted and notable speech alo yer the state. It remains to be seen whose side would profit by it. But I am willing to abide the results and challenge them to try MT. Jesse Stallings as a winner.
 l.. F. WRITTEN.
 Birmingham, September 15 1909