Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1912-08-02

the hopes and desires Of all his sup
porters All the people who were on
the ground floor in the getting of dis.
pensary graft are for Mr.. Blease, and
all the people who are under tndict-
ment or in danger Of prosecution In
connection with the frauds they have
committed are giving their thought
time and money to the one purpose OF
making Mr.. Blease governor.
| They have reason to believe that II
they are successful. prosecutions al
ready instituted, will come to naught
and the good old times about which
they now have reason to tremble with
| fear will be established beyond rea-
sonable possibility OF further interfer-
ence.
This is not a mere matter Of specu-
lation. 1t Is not mere guess at Mr.
Blease's character. 1t Is a matter OF
plain. open record.
Among those who have kept up
with events that have been transpir-
| ing in this state during the past 20
years there are thousands who do not
believe such things are possible and to
arouse them is difficult.
I'VE sincerely hope. that they Will
never see a practical realization of the
conditions we have outlined; but II
Mr.. Blease shall be elected, we feel
sure that time will vindicate us from
having attempted to raise false
alarm"
The Enquirer did not ring "a
false alarm" Prosecutions already
instituted Tin 1910) have come to
naught."
Two years ago The Enquirer under
stood. It will dispute now that 1t Is
supporting Blease and quote from Its
editorial sayings to prove that 1t is
hands off," but every Jones man in
York county knows that The Enquir-
er's influence Is helping to perpetu-
ate that same "Blease organization"
that fs built mainly on the old dispen-
sary structure"
There Is always a reason. What is
it?-Columbia State.
They began 1t by shooting peas at
us through the Lancaster News, the
Rock Hill Record and the Gaffney
Ledger Finding that peas were with
out effect, the Greenville Piedmont and
the Anderson Daily Mail popped some
caps, the News and Courier fired some
blank charges from a big gun, and
now comes the Columbia State with a
thirteen inch shell. We admit that we
feel complimented but We are still "in
the middle of the road"
newspaper authority in South Carolina
on state politics. 1t knows the politics
of every newspaper in the state and
we do not think we are putting it too
l,kx L. he
politics Of The Enquirer as well as 1t
does its own. This being true, we
think it would have been more becom-
ing in our contemporary If 1t had eth
er come out with a plain statement of
the truth or kept it's mouth shut, for
it will certainly not get any credit out
of an attempt to put The Enquirer in a
false position by inference. We have
no complaint, however. Whether right
or wrong, The Enquirer is pursuing
the course it has blocked out deliber-
ately and with its eyes open, and II
there are any consequences to bear
now or hereafter, we will not plead
either ignorance or inadvertence. We
will just take our medicine.
Politically The Enquirer belongs to
that element that believes that the best
way to deal with liquor is to outlaw it.
We do not think that there Is any 9TH
er safe and sane method whereby the
state can handle the question. That
was our view fifty years ago, 1t has
been our view during every one of the
years intervening and 1t Is our view
now. We do not think by any means
that that is the one only responsibility
of government; but we do think that 1t
is an absolutely essential principle. We
have found too that people who are
right on this question are generally
right on most other questions relating
to law and order, and that is why we
have always been aligned with the
Prohibitionists. Also 1t Is the princi-
pal reason why we have almost invari-
ably been in political opposition to the
Columbia State, and with two or three
exceptions it has been the basis Of
every passage we have had with that
paper.
Although the Columbia State may
claim this and that-that 1t stands
solely for law and order for political
decency and so on, it has been our OBJ
servation extending over the whole Of
it's life, and we so testify, that 1t has
never stood for any man in politics how
ever clean that man, or any political
policy, except when behind the man or
the policy was the right to sell liquor. 1t
has always been for local option where
there was a probability Of majority
on the liquor side. 1t prefers the So
called high license plan to any other,
and would rather have open bars than
dispensaries; but when it cannot get
the method it wants. still it is reason
ably content so long as there is some
way to sell liquor. And the News and
Courier is in the same boat.
But while the Columbia State is for
liquor first, last and all the time it has
another weakness. 1t wants an admin
istration with which it can act in har-
mony. 1t would say that it wants an
administration that it can respect; but
it might be just as correct to assert
that it wants an administration that it
can control. Perfectly natural is this,
of course; but then sometimes that
may not be altogether agreeable all
round to some of the rest Of us. There
are some of us who would prefer that
the administration be controlled only
by the constitution and the laws. But
in order to get at the real character
and motive of the Columbia State, let
us take a look into more or less recent
history.
Back in 1898 Mr.. c. c. Featherstone
made the race for governor as a Pro-
hibition candidate, principally in the
hope of being able to clean out and
destroy the already thoroughly rotten
state dispensary. He was opposed by
several other candidates, practically all
of them, including w. H. Ellerbe. rum
ming for reelection, on the platform