United labor bulletin., 1910-04-01
The MEAT BOYCOTT
and THE DRY ZONE
Would the Dry Zone be Fair to the Labor
ing Man of Small Means?-Were the
laboring Men Wise in Advocating the
Meat Boycott?
(By Fritz Hennina.)

by Fritz Henning.)
The similarity between the two sub
Jects mentioned in the title of this article
is very plain, without going into the
number of persons who would be thrown
out OF employment in case the meat boy
colt should be permanently established
which everybody takes cognizance Of
The wet zone proposition is not only
equally disadvantageous to the working
people but more SO.
If the wet zone Should be- established.
the socalled Larimer street wholesale
liquor house would have a chance to sell
its inferior goods in the dry district. OF
course, the Bookkeeping processes would
be adopted but the sales would be made.
Then there are families, good people,
who would like their regular can of beer
for supper, or at the supper. The only
trouble to which the head of the family
would be put, would be to go few doors
away to get what was wanted. If the
dry zone were established he would have
to travel perhaps mile or so and pay
his carefare going and coming, before he
could get what he wanted. He might not
come back at all. Men are human and
are influenced by other men. all equally
good, but subject to the temptations
which this system would throw around
them.
This system would throw the small sa-
loon man out of business and the sa-
looms in the so-called Wet Zone would
have to pay three times as much in the
matter of license as they had paid before
and considering this they would have to
charge a great deal higher price for each
oil of sold r,t,1l le
that men of small means who could af-
ford the comforts OF the nearby saloons
would either be deprived of these or else
in order to obtain them would pay twice
as much as they were worth and in the
end would deprive himself of the means
of providing for his family in the way in
which he does it now.
1t would have the same effect as the
meat boycott, which would deprive thou
sands of men of their work and this
would react upon the honest saloon man,
who deals out the best liquors he has at
the most reasonable price he can, of the
trade which he otherwise would have. In
other words, his customers would natur-
ally fall off. They are out of work and
in time, he would be out of business The
meat boycott would inevitably produce
such rise in prices on the necessities of
life that, perhaps three times as much
as is now charged would have to be paid
for these ordinary necessities. This
would react on the laboring man, whose
wages are not raised in proportion, to an
extent that anyone may readily realize.
He will be not only deprived of his ordi-
nary and reasonable Indulgence in the
stimulants which relieve him after his
day of toll and set his nerves at rest and
which are really necessary to his con-
tinued existence, but will embarrass him
seriously in the mere matter of securing
f1icent food on which to live and pro-
tect and keep his family. 1t will also
throw thousands of men out of work en-
| tirely-people who are now employed and
well employed. IL will act exactly as
would the dry zone act, keeping hundreds
and hundreds OF honest men who are in
the saloon business. barteuders and 9th.
ers connected with the business, out of
employment. All these have families. All
these have as much right to the privilege
of earning their daily bread as have the
preachers, who live on the bread earned
by others.
The meat boycott will not cost the
packers anything. 1t is the workingmen
who, as in all other such conflicts of la
Dor and capital, have to stand the brunt.
The man who works for wages must have
meat for his little ones at home. He can
not earn the price with which to pur
chase it, at the price which will be
charged. If someone not so strong as
some other yields to the natural com
mandment of God 10 provide for his own
and takes what does not belong to him
according to legal parlance but in fact
belongs to him because he is son of
God, being a creature of Gods handiwork,
he would be sent 20 Jail and his family,
whom he sought to help will be the
worse for the fact that he tried to save
them.