Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-10-23
4 sboek to personal Liberty"


six months imprisonment instead of "a a
mere fine. for a loan shark charging 300
per cent is an approach to punishment
that fits the crime. And IL is sentence
matter for serious refection.-P
Arkns.
But six months imprisonment for
the offense of the fiend who sells the
tseze that robs7the homes and makes
the loan shark business possible, is an
outrage on ebuffness." an interference
with personal liberty and is per-
petrafed by "sumptuary" law, ac-
csrding to our neighbor. 1t is ap-
parent that there is no money in adj
vertising the loan shark business, or it
would have more friends. If Il could
make of itself social fad necessity,
the laws against loan sharking would
become "sumptuary. too. Bad as 1t
is, we believe il could never find any
poverty desperate enough to patronize
it, were it not for the curse of liquor
sharks" the cheapest. meanest, the
most God -despised criminals that have
ever disgraced humanity.
The Nashville Tennessean refers to
Secretary of the Navy Daniels recent
order and to personal liberty in
way that is complimentary to oft-re-
peated logic of the kennebec Journal.
II says:
Secretary Daniels shocked to the
very limit of patient sufferanee those
highly sensitive individuals who are
SO exceedingly jealous of their in
dividuai rights and personal liberty
when it comes to the use of liquor, as
he has issued an order that there must
be no more drunkenness among the
officers Of the navy.
This is what Secretary Daniels has
to say with respect to intoxication
among the naval officers:
If an employer chooses to overlook in
toxication in one whose wages he pays
that is another matter. No one Is hurt
But intoxication of a naval officer is a
reflection on the entire service ana on
the administration which fails TO deal
with it effectively and firmly The naval
officer il In the pay OF all the people,
public official, and must not give occa-
sion TO public scandal.
1t is evident that Secretary Daniels
does not know what Dangerous ground
he is treading upon when he tackles
the sacred rights of liquor, for John
Rarleycorn, at least in these parts,
measures far above Thomas Jefferson
or Andrew Jackson as an exponent of
pure Democracy. and whenever any
Democrat attempts TO curtail his
rights or abridge his liberty that Of
Tending official is set down as traitor
to his party and his country.
In Tennessee we have such ardent
defendants of the rights and liberties
of liquor that one of them, railroad
lobbyist and publisher of a liquor Or
gan. man who is SO prominent and
distinguished that he is a fool about
himself publicly advises judges and
other officials TO disregard their own
sworn duty and refuse TO enforce the
law where IL forbids the sale of liquor.
He says that enlightened city people
ought not to respect a law of this
character that has been passed by a
lot of ignorant ahill billies." He says
that such law is subyersive of the
rights and liberties of the people.
IL sotttttdfy Dduicls Sfouiu iidppfh
TO come to Tennessee and get into the
company of these true and loyal
liquor Democrats. who believe the
smell of whiskey to be the true test of
Democracy. he would soon be inn
pressed with the awful fact that he Of
Tended the genius OF pure Democracy
when he set ban on drunkenness in
the navy.
What do you remember about that ?
Doesn't il sound like what you heard
In 1911? Did not certain high and
mighty Democrats Of this State preach
the same doctrine that city people
should not obey the laws of the State,
but should secede and live under rum
trust laws? Did not Democratic lead
% then, and do they not today be-
1--we the smell Of booze the true test
efsdemocracy2 Do not their organs