Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1912-01-17


enforced, he overlooks the fact that pub
lie sentiment often has the force of law
and sometimes as, notably, in the case
of parts of the Sunday laws, it virtually
repeats law. In Portland. as in other
Maine cities the conditions which result
IN the failures of prohibition are due to
q public sentiment which is not confined
TO any one class in the community We
assume that Mr. Stelzle would not urge
partial enforcement of the prohibitory
Statutes. We assume that he would have
the law enforced against rich and poor
alike. And We are quite sure that he
would md the problem of making pro-
nibitlon prohibit very much more intri-
cate and troublesome than he seems to
think it is.
Undoubtedly Mr.. Stelzle recognizes
that one Of the most dangerous wea-
pons of the liquor interests is the
booze club" on these blots on
civic cleanliness are founded the poor
mans demand for saloons, also the
claims of those who promote the Ii
quor traffic for fairness" We be-
lieve that the first duty of an incom-
ing temperance administration is to
create law that will effectually wipe
out every booze club in the State of
Maine. We believe that as long as
men of standing in communities al
low their names on the rolls of clubs
Which circumyent the law, or give en-
enlargement to such places by their
occasional presence, just so long will
politicians who can be bought by
makers and sellers of booze, oppose
the law and encourage violation by
be enforced
Wherever you find man or news
paper declaring that the law cannot
be enforced. you will find a man or
newspaper that does not wish the
law enforced.
Mr.. Sickle knows that the Maine
law can be enforced as well as any
other law ON the statutes, ii those
VINO eternally oppose the law would
give it as much support as they do
other laws.
Mr.. StelZle does not have to be a
Maine man to be familiar with the
arguments and the trickery of the IL
quor interests and their paid tools.
He is from New York,s East Side and
has seen licensed liquor traffic and
political and police notification of
other laws at their worst. He knows
that the liquor traffic is the founda-
ton of nine-tenths of all the crime
and the protector OF criminals. He
would have Maine aroused to her
danger If she allows group of I'M
scrupulous politicians to sell her to the
liquor interests. He knows that the
law can be enforced if officials would
do as they swear to do when they as
sumo office. He would not urge par
tial enforcement; he would ask moth
ing further than that officers obey
their oaths of Office and cease their
abuse of the law.
Every compromise with the liquor
evil or any one of its multiple tools,
is a step backward. There is no reg
ulation" except to concede the right
of the makers and sellers of booze to
do more business.
Any personal, community, state or
federal recognition Of the traffic but
lends encouragement to an unmiti-
gated evil
T. Dewitt Talmadge said of the
liquor evil: Compromise with
1t, You had better compromise
with the panther in his jungle;
with the cyclone in it's flight;
with the Egyptian plague as it
blotches an empire; with Apollyon
for whom this evil is. recruiting
officer, quarter master and COM
mander-in- chief
Touching the personal liberty
sophistry. John Stuart Mills said: MY
liberty ends when it begins to involve
the possibility of ruin to my neigh
Dor
A foreigner who had come to this
country filled with old world appetites
and customs and new world persona
liberty notions, came out of a saloon
niled with too much liberty" for his
equilibrium. In waving his arms
about he connected with the nose o.
an American and was promptly