The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-07-29
THE CRIME OF 1909

To the Editor of The Age-Herald: ''rhou canst not say did 1t; never shake Thy gory locks at me-"
 Considering the earnestness, and pro- claimed virtuous intentions of the pro- hibitionists, through whose exertions the Fuller and Carmichael bills were enacted frto law, it were not a. little astonishing that they should have been so short sighted as to jeopardize then existing statutes of the most wholesome, salutary, 'temperate' nature, restricted as they were in operation. Good Christian doc Urine would have dictated that we hold fast to that which Is good. It suits them now to make capital out of the alleged infrmities of the Smith bill, under the provisions of which, as they contend, and for the purpose of the argument the contention must be admitted as, when the proposition is denied, there is an end or the argument, except to the cult of Goldsmith's school master, for cen though vanquished he could argue still, barrooms may be set up in lovely Avon- dale. in charming woodlawn, and in feaceful East Lake. Who is to blame for the possibility of the perpetration of such an outrage on these aggregations or homes, these
 'sTemples of cherished and fond recollec- ' tions,
 Where hopes and ambitions long dead, ~.-.r are embal lmed
 Where the peaceful commune with their
 heart-deep affections,
 And storms of ill-fortune are stlled and
 becalmed.
 'Where the flowers of memory twined in
 affection,
 Retain ev'ry smile, ev'ry nod that they
 bore
 When they blosomed at first on a fond recollection.
 And breathe the same incense they
 breathed as of yore" F
 It were hard to believe that the vir- tuous steersmen who piloted the ship of state during the troublous times, the sebbs and floods and the storms of the eser-memorable year 1909. were so carried away by the torrent of public virtue with which the state wac overwhelmed in that year. that they deliberately brought their charge upon the rocks and chills they row so busily point out. Charity de- n,ands that the head and not the heart be impeached; that we believe that they were so borne forward by the storm of enthusiasm engendered by their conscious : ness of power they lost their reckoning that flushed with success. and graced with wreaths of victory. they quite for- got, if they ever entertained the idea of the effect of revusion in the hearts Of the people, If the people were ever with them.
 The French, in on outburst of fool : eeb enthusiasm statute, deliberately abolished God, on one occasion: abolished him forever. 1t you please, quite forgetting thot 1T you take the wings of the morning and go to the uttermonst parts of the earth; To, God is there But they abolished him, never tleless, by statute. They too were flushed with victory. and took reck- oning of the latitude and longitude of the French ship of state at the mo- n,ent of the enactment of that menor- able statute only having made no pro vision against the winds. and the tides. and the currents by which quite 'in- anchored 1t to nothing, the barque in which their frail humanities were braving the seas, was to be dr,tle.l and driven hither and yon.
 Victory takes care of-itself:
 -The painful warrior famousel for
 fight,
 After q thousand victories. one foiled, Is from the book of honor razed quite, And all the rest forgot for which he
 toiled."
 The wise general has an eye tc pos eible defeat. and rnakes a provision against disaster Ultimate defeat nes CT entered into the calculations of the