The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1909-11-03

Columbia. Oct. ss.--Claiming for
the State the whole Of the I4anahan
claim Of more than $4,000 upon the
grounds Of overchargos and payment
Of rebates. and that the state should
nnd an over1udsment against the Bal
tinors arm. Col. T. b. Fielder, of At
lanta. In his argument before the dis
pensery windins-up commission. char
aotsrissd the Lanahans as the "arch-
conspirators OF them ALL" and painted
: picture OF the graft of the closing
days Of the dispensary system In
South Carolina. Disavowing any In
tention upon the part Of his client TO
deal fradulently with the state and
laying at the feet Of the dispensary
onlcials themselves the blame for all
that has been revealed In connection
with the "systera." Col. w. A. Clark.
Of this city. ask ed that the claim of
the LAnahan nrin be paid.
70 was quite battle between the
rt~o attorneys to-day. Col Fielder In
~ entertaining and forceful manner
presented In striking language the de-
tails Of the LaniIhan alleged grating
He ala not hesitate to brand a. cor
rupt the dealings OF this firm with the
state dispenssry oficials. He minced
not his words in referring to the
members Of the firm and called the
whole dispensary system corrupt
and foul machire" In these and var
ious terms. Col Clark presented a
written argument. from which he
stepped At timei, to refer to matters
OF testimony ard evidence that has
been introduced In connection with
this case. There were one or two in
stances OF sharp colloquy between the
attorneys for the State and for the
flrm of william Lanahan & Sons. Of
Baltimore. n
The Lanahan claim has been consid-
I. erably aired. II was this claim that
caused the test that was called Field
er's Phial" to be shown before the dis
pensary winding.up commission. The
trend OF this test was to show that
straight whiskeys were not shipped
here by this firm. but the bottle stun
was q combination Of intensac. rye
whiskey and spirits. and sometimes
JUST the rye coloring matter. A chem
|. - was called here to testify before
Qe commission as to this. test. In a
Io<ter read today. not put in evidence.
! however. the nrm calls attention to
certain matters touching this test
Mr.. Lanahan himself having stated on
the stand during a previous meeting
that he did not recognize the test. On
the part of the firm. Mr.. Clark sub
mitted a chemical analysis. I'm which
u was shown that the whiskey con-
tained no harmful ingredients. and
that " was rye whiskey.
The arguments today recalled many
things Of interest In connection with
the claim. Before the original inves-
tigating committee there was testi-
mony given by Lewis w. Parker. the
we'll known mill man. and others, In
Guiding Col. Clark himself, who had
stated that Sam Lanahan told. him
that no business could be had In this
state from the dispensary board with
out the payment of rebates. These
records were reviewed today. At one
time member OF the Lanahan firm
addre7 letter 10 the Governor.
saying - there was something
wrong here. that his firm could not
ret the business II should and asking
the Governor to help them out. Later
this firm did get big business. as
shown by the records.
The wylie affidavit was I'm evidence
again today. This was only referred
TO In that portion In reference to the
5000 rebate that Wylie says Farnum
gave him for the order OF 900 cases
Of the Lanahan whiskey. The signifl-
cance Of this Is the fact that Mr.. Ian
ahan on the stand here swore that his
nrm gave no rebates. and had no
agent In this state. except for Boykln.
who was agent a short while.
In opposing for the state. Col Field
er made an arraignment C. the Lana
han flrm In Its dealing with the State
IA. the Lanhan matter was set out.
Not only do we contend for the alb
sorption Of their claim" said Col. Fell
der. but n difference due the state
on the other side" From the Lana