The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-08-19
SEES EVIDENCE OF
ANOTHER STAMPEDE
Rogers Writes on Repeal of
Statewide Law
EXISTING LAW A FARCE
says Anti-Saloon League Is Preparing
to Stampede Legislature to Con-
tinue Policy Repudiated
at the Polls
EXISTING LAW A FARCE

l read with deep interest the article
by Rev. George Eaves in The Age
Herald last Sunday entitled THE Eng
lishmans Budget and this interest
was accentuated by the fact that only
few moments before | had read in
dispatch from your Montgomery cor
respondent a copy of the petition to
the legislature to preserve the present
state wide prohibition law, which Is be-
ing sent out by the Anti-Saloon league
broadcast throughout the state, TO
voters and non-voters alike, presum-
ably to men, women and children as
blank is left for the signer TO In
dictate whether or not the recipient
of the blank petition Is a voter.
In my opinion 1t is unfortunate that
every person receiving one of the Anti
Saloon leagues blank petitions did not
have an opportunity of reading Rev.
caves interesting article before sign
ing and returning the blank, for If
such opportunity had been afforded the
signed petitions returned would, doubt
not, be few and far between.
While | do not agree with the rev.
erend doctor in all the statements or
In the main l believe he is correct and
In many respects absolutely so.
Like DR.. Eaves | believe that whisky
Is a fit subject for scientific and rig
orous control" and that "splashing a
puddle to make it look like the ocean
does not make 1t the ocean," and that
zeal not according to scientific facts
Is generally more fruitful of evil than
downright wickedness. Law cannot
control ignorant or evil Wills. The
cure Is the education of the will
l believe that Rev. Eaves stated the
plain and unvarnished truth in his ar
ticle when he said
We have statutes on our books
which We cannot get officers to uni-
formly enforce or courts to sustain,
and we are driven to conclude that we
are developing both lawlessness and by
pocrisy. The very man who votes for
state wide prohibition too often smells
of whisky and congratulates himself
that his constituents have no voice over
his private appetite"
Every fair-minded. reasoning and
thinking citizen of Alabama must admit
that statewide prohibition in Ala
bama, and especially In the cities of
the state, like statewide prohibition
in every other state in which 1t has
been tried, is a moekery, a delusion,
snare and an incentive to lawless-
ness. We all know that the prob ibi-
tion law is VIGOROUSLY and openly vio-
lated 1855 days out of the year in Bir-
min CHAM, Montgomery and Mobile l
doubt not but that the same is true
in many of the smaller cities of the
state, because only few days ago the
chief of police of a small city to the
south of us-the home of two demo-
cratic candidates for high state offices
stated in one of Birmingham court
rooms in my hearing while he was
waiting for the case in which he was
witness to be called that there were
$50 or 800 blind tigers in his city.
lie may have been joking when he
made this statement. but Judging from
the expression on his face and the man
ner In which he made this statement
(Which was in answer to question
propounded to him) l opine not
Alabama has certainly given statewide
prohibition fair trial, and here as else
where it has proven to be failure.
Furthermore, it will always be failure
until a stringent law Is enacted and rigor-
ousy enforced that will absolutely pro-
hibit and prevent the importation of in
toxicating liquors and beverages into a
dry state for any purpose whatsoever.
But in the event that such law is ever
passed and its constitutionality sustained
by the supreme court of the United
States, statewide prohibition everywhere
like the old blue laws of Connecticut
will be only memory unhonored and I'M
sung. Why? / am asked. For the very
simple reason that only a few, very
very few, advocates of statewide prohibit
ton are total abstainers, while the vast
majority are exceedingly willing to accept
st, Paul's advice to Timothy, to drink
no longer water, but use little wine for
thy stomach's sake and thine often in
flrmities," and when their stock on hand
of that little wine," or, perchance, bour-
bon or rye or brandy. is exhausted and
they can get no more, their own stomach
will be touched, their own personal lib
erty will be attacked. and a cry will arise
from everywhere In every dry" state
20, Mr. Legislators, please repeal. and
that at once, this Ubiquitous and obnox-
ious law that prohibits and prevents me-
as well as my neighbor from getting my
regular and necessary medicine-that pre-
scribed by st. Paul to Timothy; It was
all right to prohibit my neighbor from
getting his, but 1t Is rank injustice to pro-
hibit mel
AS l have already stated, Alabama has
given statewide prohibition a fair trial
and 1t has proved failure. Yet, never
theless and Notwithstanding this fact
cannot be successfully and truthfuily
controverted or contradicted, the Anti
Saloon league is busily preparing to stam-
pede the legislature of 1911, as it did the
unhonored one Of 1907, and force upon us
a continuation of conditions that were re-
pudiated by large majority of the dem
oeratic voters of Alabama on May e. 1910
when Colonel O'Neal was nominated for
governor. In furtherance of that express
sion of the majority, the democrats of
Alabama in convention assembled incor-
porated in its platform plank declaring
for the true and pure democratic princi-
pie of local option or 'self-government,'
and 1t Ill behooves the Anti-Saloon league
to coerce the members of the incoming
legislature into rejecting or ignoring that
plank-even In view of the precedent set
by the preceding legislature.
As l define It, local option does not
necessarily mean return to the open sa-
loon as it existed before the adoption of
statewide prohibition. or before Jefferson
county voted itself dry" but even IL 1t
did that condition, In my humble judg
ment, is preferable to the present almost
unrestricted and Jindisturbed regime of
blind tigerism" throughout Alabama |
have no fear, however, that IL the incom-
ing legislature repeats the present state
wide prohibition law and places local
option law upon the statute book that
anywhere in the state of Alabama will
there be a return of the open saloon as
1t existed in the past. But the repeal of
the present statewide prohibition law and
the enactment of local option Tor local
self governmenD law is matter to be
settled by the legislators themselves with
out any coercion by the Anti-Saloon
league, either directly or indirectly.
THOS. NJ. ROGERS.
Birmingham. August IS, 1910.
fft5s-s
Nesbltt Back From Decatur