The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1913-08-07
Keep the Issue Clear.

There are many otherwise good
men who intend to vote for the re-
establishing of the despensary on the
10th of August because they think
that this will be the best way to reg
ulate the whiskey traffic. In other
words. they think that this course is
the expedient one Let me say first
of all that l am convinced that this
is not the case, but am sure that
return to the old dispensary system,
which has been tried and found want
ing, would be but multiplying our
troubles. We have our blind tigers
now, but if we went back to the old
dispensary system our own eXpe-
rience tells US and the experience of
those living in the dispensary coun-
ties today confirms it, that we would
but be adding the dispensary to the
blind tigers. l can see how man
who never had any experience with
the dispensary system with all of it's
attendant rottenness could vote for
it, but I am at loss to understand
how we VINO endured it's noisesome
stencil for seventeen years could
deliberately vote to fasten it upon
ourselves again.
But the question We are to decide
when we come to cast our ballots is
not one of expediency, even if it
could be proved that the re-estab-
lishment of the dispensary were the
most expedient course. 1t is moral
question, one between right and
wrong. We cannot afford to tempor-
ize with evil or to make truce with
the devil. We retard our civilization
and stultify our manhood every time
We gain the consent of our con-
sciences to do so. The whiskey traf-
fc is wrong, and it can't be made
right, though the law may make it re-
spectacle by throwing its protecting
arm about it. True, whiskey is being
sold now by blind tigers, but that is
the only way a self-respecting people
should permit it to be sold, in the
back alleys and down in the cellars,
in the dark and on the sly, by negroes
and lawless whites. That is just the
difference between the dispensary
and the blind tigers. One drives it's
trade in the dark and under cover,
recognized law-breaker. But the
dispensary occupies a building on
the principal street in town and is
made respectable by the loving arm
Of the law thrown about it. No
consideration can ever make it right
to do wrong, and the whiskey traffic
is an unmitigated wrong, though it
tries to bribe and thus soothe our
consciences by the paltry revenue
which it pays. l like the ring of the
words of a certain state officer in
prohibition Kansas. He said that
Kansas would be for prohibition even
if it could be proved that it entailed
a financial loss on the state (and it
doesn't) for Kansas sets a higher
value on manhood than money.
4 Christian and church member
cannot afford to vote for the re-es-
tablishment of the dispensary for he
would thus be giving his approval
to one of the greatest curses of the
race. He can't afford to temporize
with. such an evil. When it asks him
to give it the respectability and pro-
lection of the law there is only one
thing that he can do even though he
were convinced that the present num-
Der of blind tigers would increase
hundred fold; as a follower of Him
who was manifested that He might
destroy the works of the devil he is
false to his Lord unless he casts the
whole weight of his influence to an
initiate this masterpiece of the devil.
Nor can any true citizen afford to
cast his vote in favor of the dispen-
sary for it has been tried in South
Carolina and it has polluted every
thing and everybody it touched and
cast reproach on the fair name of
our great state. We do not want to
degrade her to the level of common
saloon keeper.
would be glad if every member of
the church who has made up his
mind to vote for the dispensary would
read the following story which met
my eye the other day. A certain
young man who had a weakness for
strong drink lived in a certain town
where a campaign was being con-
Quoted for the establishment of a
saloon. The young man knowing
his weakness worked hard to defeat
the saloon but the majority said that