The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-09-30

D. ohibition Tn the wish to be fair The Adeyrtiser publsnes the letter of Senator Reyn. tls which called for the reply. The letter is as follows:
 Editor Standard:-Perhaps 1t Is due
 to the people of your county Tor me 10 l stare my views briefly on the question of the constitutional amendment whicL | is being discussed in your columns al l this time In the first place you state that 'you oo not favor 1t because 1t Is police
 measure. Now, the present consliu- ton which the editor of The Standard ! helped to frame contains an admittea police measure. This IS the provision Iforbidding lotteries or gift enterprises
 Are you entirely consistent? Did you oppose In any manner this part of the constitution when you was assisting in framing the document
 You state you do not favor incorpor- ating prohibition in the constitutions ! until 1t has been tried. submit tha: prohibition has been the settled policy of more than 90 per cent of the terri tory of the state for a period of from ten to twenty-five years For example Bibb county has been a prohibition county. except three years of dispen- sary at Blocton, for more than thirty years. And the longer the law has been in force with us the more effec- tive and satisfactory to all our people has 1t become. It Is only in a com paratively few cities and towns that the sale of whiskey has been legalizeo or allowed in Alabama for more than twenty years. We have gradually progressed in the extension and opera ton of the prohibition law until 1t now covers the whole state and 1t seems to me nonsense to cry for furth- CT trial under these conditions. And we must recognize that even .h Mont gomery, Birmingham and Mobile. the law Is being enforced and under the new prohibition measures will doubt less continue to be observed almost to the letter.
 Now, you will doubtless criticise me as having voted for state wide pro-
 hibition when the state platform call ed for local option. l answer that the
 first legislature after the adoption oi
 that platform passed a local option hill submitting the matter to each county to decide for itself. Mark you the brewers and wiskey men of Ala.
 bama and other states fought us to
 the utmost in the passage of this county local option law. notwithstand- ing the platform called for 1t. The same people reinforced by a few gen.
 uine but misled prohibitionists are to- day fighting constitutional prohibit tion. And further. ter the passage of the local option Jaw and under it. operation such counties as Calhoun. Jefferson and many others went dry. forseeing that every other county in Alabama would follow suit except Montgomery and Mobile, and that with
 whiskey legalized in those counties, the local option of the dry counties would be almost nuliified the iegisla- ture very properly as it seemed to us passed a state wide prohibition law. We simply recognized an entirely diff freent situation existing from that which obtained at the time the plat form was drawn, and obeying the al- most unanimous voice of the people of the state, we passed the state wide law, opposed of course again by the brewers and whiskey men and a few misguided prohibitlonists and. mark you, the brewers and whiskey men vigorously insisted on county local option, the same identical thing which
 they had a few months previously
 fought with all their might.
 Now. notice another thing. They
 do not now oppose the state wide pro- hibition law but on the contrary plead for 1t as against constitutional pro-
 nibition. You see they have progress | ed considerably, but they always want anything except the medicine which
 the prohibttionists propose to adminis-
 ter.
 Another thing Mir. Editor. when the
 legislature was considering the state
 wIde prohibition law. they clamored
 for its submission to a vote of the peo- pie of the state instead of its enact
 ment by the legislature. Now we propose to submit to the people of the 1 state a measure on which the whiskey l Interests will stand n much better
 show than they would have done on
 statutory pronibition before the peo-
 pie. and still they are not satisfied. think any candid person will admit
 that their course and views are entire-
 ly inconsistent and that what they
 want Is simply to be let alone so they can in some way at some time stand probably through. the legislature high license or other so-called regula- tton plan of selling whiskey.
 For example. we have before us at this very time dangerous situation in point We have two announced candidates for governor who are strong prohibitionists. We have prospective If not an actual candidate who Is an avowed local optlonist Per- maps some other prohibitionist such as Carmichael or Weakley may run. What IS plainer than that under such cir cumstances the local option candidate may be successful and by possibility the legislature / pass laws allow ing the sale of wnIskey in some loca!i- ties and thus undo the work of years by such men and newspapers as your self and your own excellent journal? Will the election Of a local option governor be accepted otherwise than as @ step backward?
 Is 1t not better to gtop the agitation by settling forever in the affirmative the proposition that whiskey has sinn- ed away its day of grace in Alabama and thus giving final notice to the brewers that they must seek other fields than our own beloved state for the dissemination of their pro- paganda?
 As heard 1t illustrated a few days ago In a most forcible manner by one of those apt illustrators which we so often find in the scriptures. After David had felled and killed the Giant Goliath by a stone from his sling, ne did not stop there. He went up to him and took out his sword and cut off his head" The prohibitionists have slain the monster King Alcohol but they do not propose to stop till they have cut of his head. Win not you. Mir. Editor and others who are at heart with us cn the fight against liquor. come out and help us? Can you and others afford to keep the com pany in which you must travel? M- Editor the constitution of Alabama is not. after all. a scared instrument It was made by men. It was decreeo by the people and surely they may change 1t if they so desire In my life I have lived under three constitu- tions in Alabama and each of them as