Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1914-07-17

sentative unit Emporia Is a town
of 10000 people, the county seat of
county of $4,000 people. 1t is
typical Kansas community. In EN-
poria are 81 groceries, five clothing
stores, four dry goods stores, three
furniture stores, three hardware
stores, two big book stores, five
bakeries, five banks, five drug
stores, two music stores, three jew
elry stores and six hotels. And this
spring, following a year of drought
and bad crops, the town raised $75,-
GOO for Y. NJ. c. A. building.
THE town has nearly 20 miles of
paving, - miles of stone or cement
sidewalks, owns its water works and
light plant-the latter being operat-
ed under a lease-collects its own
garbage and disposes of it in an in
Generator, sweeps its streets, has
school property exclusive of it's high
school worth hundred and ninety
three thousand dollars, and high
school, just completed and equipped
at cost of a hundred and fifty thou
sand dollars. Three public libraries
are available to those who desire to
store their minds with more or less
useful knowledge, and 30 churches
receive the towns devotions. An
average six months has just passed
and the police court record is this
for these 10000 people and their
tributary $4,000: There have been
"a arrests for drunkenness and
about 1874 for everything in the
police court.
THE taxes are low because our
jails are empty more or less of the
time, and the cost of criminal trials
is SO small that the average time
consumed with criminal cases in the
district court is but one-fourth of the
time consumed at each quarterly
session. Last year these $4,000
people contributed eight prisoners to
the state penitentiary. We have in
.,
IT'S students in higher institutions
of learning inside the state, and
many outside the state that escape
enumeration in college catalogues of
the state. There are 4540 taxpayers
in the county, who own approximate
! ly SAL 100000 worth of property,
and who, for all purposes state,
city, county and school-pay $685.
600, and do not have any help from
saloon licenses to do it; but then the
legal machinery of the county is not
clogged by the caprices of whisky,
and it costs us only $13,736 a year
to run our courts.
I'VE seem to use our $40 a head,
saved from the nations average
! liquor bill, fairly we'll. We seem to
put it into groceries and clothing.
houses and schools and libraries and
churches and municipal improve
ments. And then we save some of it
for a bank deposit of $3,500,000,
which is the average Lyon county de-
post for the three years last past
This is considerably above the aver
age deposit in the country. When
one considers that the total deposit
is distributed among 1850 accounts
the figures do not show "a prosperity
denied by the facts, as it would if
we had large deposits and few de-
! pOstors.
We have honest politics because
we have no dealings with the saloon
crowd. In Lyon county and in EN-
poria a generation has elapsed since
there was a defalcation of a penny
of public funds. There is no pur-
chasable vote in the county. In
Kansas candidates buy printers ink
| instead of beer on election day.
And, on the whole, printers ink is
more wholesome and leaves fewer
bad effects on a commonwealth than
beer We have acquired the taste
| for printers ink and have lost the
taste for beer. That is about the
net result of 80 years of the prohib-
! tory law in Kansas.
What will this taste for ink
bring us in the end? AS state we
have reached a stage of econom ic
and social adjustment much nearer
the ideal status of the dreamer than
even the most radical visionary
would have thought possible without
a downright change of the social
order. Glass poverty and class
riches are practically eliminated
from Kansas. The door of oppor-
tunity stands well ajar for every
one. Education, from the kinder
garten to the masters degree, is
free. Free Libraries, full of books,
stand open in practically every viii
lage and town in Kansas, and
thoroughly organized state travelling
library covers the country districts"