Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1911-08-16

conviction that no good cause can be
helped forward by falsebood; SECOND,
! will give a rule by which I proye
all statements | read concerning condi-
tons in the states. Look around yo,,
in your town, note the conditions
compare them with the claims of the
literature sent out by the rum trust
ard the press that is working for the
repeal Of the prohibitory law. AS an
example take the statement that pro-
hibition is Il failure; now applv the
rule. Has 1t been a failure i'm your
town? 1t has not been in my town.
In this towH of Palermo town
without village-in the old DAYS
there We're six places where LIQUOR
vas sold Today no such places exist.
and our boys never saw such place.
On the cid coach road from Augusta
to Belfast there Were fourteen road
houses. all of them sold rum: today
there is no place on the entire route
of more than 40 miles where liquors
are sold So | might speak of the old
days when all the supplies for the lum-
her camps on the Dead river were
drawn by horses from Skowhegan,
every hotel and many stores sold
rum. The old road from Portland
through TO Bethel was the same; it
was the same everywhere.
Now | ask has not prohibition pro-
hleited? If not what has wrought
this change?
Now take one more statement from
the same source-that the rum seller
Is In FAVOR of prohibition and will
Vete to retain the amendment. Apply
the RUE. Are the men who have sold
or would sell rum in your town work.
ing overtime for temperance Will
they or the men who drink rum or
old cider vote to retain the amend
ment? As you find conditions in your
town so you will find them al! over
the State, and the parties who are
sowing this lie broadcast over the
State know it to be 4 lie
| have lived in this town Il years
and have seen but two drunken men
in all that time. and but one of them
a resident of this town. The conditions
existing in my town exist in other
towns all over Maine (the larger
towns and cities excepteD.
Obadiah Gardner is reported as say
ing: II know of saloons that have
been conducted in the same premises
and under the same management for
the past - years" Now I lived some
years in Rockland and did some work
for prohibition and would like to ask
a question. Did Mr.. Gardner ever en-
ter a protest against the conditions he
describes? If he did | never heard
If il. There have been times when
Rockland was dry. made so because
the hest citizens arose in their might
and demanded the enforcement of the
law: was Mr.. Gardner among those
responsible for the drouth? | answer
cmphatically: No"
I notice the rum press Is much trou-
bied because Mrs. stevens says that
those who vote Yes" will by that act
become allies of the criminal classes.
Well. isn't il true? Then the ques-
tion do you want To apply the remarks
of Mrs. Stevens to your friends who
vote yes. Well. | do not assume the
responsibility Tor my friends being in
that company. And if / have friends
who vote with the united criminal
classes | must believe that they think
their interests are allied with the in
terests of that class.
Now is this party question? Apply
the rule. certainly we shall not divide
on party lines in this town and Sen
ator Johnson. the Sentinel and Argus
combined can not divide US that way
Speaking OF the Argus | have been
quite intimately acquainted with that
paper for more than IS years, and 1
do not remember one moral reform
ii has not opposed. In the fight to
reinstate prohibition more than 80
years ago. it led its party and made
temperance a party question. And its
party was defeated on that issue in
1860. Its position on the slavery cues
ton is we'll remembered by every G.
A. r. man in Maine, and its present
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