The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1914-08-28
CANNOT REGULATE
LIQUOR TRAFFIC
WASTED EFFORT OF 27s YEARS
SHOWS CHARACTERIZATION Is
NECESSARY /.
THE GHASTLlEST JOKE
SAM SMALL sTIRs CROWD IN
STATEWIDE PROHIBITION Lee
TURE AT RURAL HE
THE GHASTLlEST JOKE

! Especial to The Richmond Nirginian.)
| Rural Retreat, Aug. 27.--Rev. Sam
Small, the national lecturer of the
| Anti-Saloon League of America de-
! livered here tonight stirring and
convincing speech on Statewide prohi-
bition. DR.. Small is veteran cam
paigner. who spoke with General Will
| liam Terry through this district in
! 1870. when the latter was a candidate
| for congress. His speech was filled
with logic and eloQuence.
1T IL the liquor traffic and Its sa
looms that makes this campaign neces
sary.' he said. Let the men who are
conducting the traffic and those who
are defending 1t stop their operations
tomorrow and the fight will die on your
hands. Therefore the issue Is ines
capable 1t cannot be successfully
| masked, disguised Of mistaken. Wheat
we are to decide on September 20 is
whether the liquor traffic IN Virginia
shall continue by our consent. or be
outlawed by our verdict ut the polls.
TITS origin Is devilish. It's history
is Infamous and Its presence is a con-
stant menace to individual. domestic.
social. Industrial and political peace and
welfare.
Virginia will be the first Of seven
States voting upon this anti saloon Is
sue this year and her verdict will have
| a powerful effect for good or III in all
those other elections,
This old mother OF States and states
men. OF presidents, of the illustrious
president now in Office and of presi-
dents yet to be, cannot afford to put
bar sinister upon her shield by re-
cordtng her sovereign voice upon the
side OF this pariah Of the modern world
the liquor traffic. She will wash her
robes of statehood clean of its pollut-
ing blemishes and take her place,
waiting for her. in the growing ga
laxy OF prohibition States
Want to StraneuIafe 1t.
But we are told that regulation ts
! the best way to control the liquor
traffic. We do not want TO regulate
1t; we want to strangulate it. AL
ready the American people have been
I busy ais years with efforts TO reRu-
late this particular traffic~~and the
results are before us. All the saloons
In America tonight are regulated ga
loons-and aren't they handles? Regu-
iation Of this irregular and incorrigi-
BILE demon has come to he the ghast-
liest Joke of the age IN which we
live.
Let me tell you that there Is no
device ever born OF the wit of man
/ that so efectualiy and satisfactorily
regulates the liquor traffic as does
! law making 1t Illegal and criminal
| Anything short of that Is license and
makes a laughing stock of law and
! justice.
/ But. says the Richmond Liquor
fSelf-Guzzlement association, the State
needs the money the liquor traffic pays
| into the treasury. Now. what I want
! to know ia. did they make that one
/ of their arguments to McAdoo. Hous-
! ton and Williams when they were
pleading for a regional reserve bank
/ in Richmond Did they tell these fed
.era1 officials that Virginia Is SO poor
and hard pushed as 10 fall instantly
| from booming prosperity To bankruptcy
by the loss of half a million dollars
! OK liquor taxes? They did not and
/ they would not have done 30 at the
muzzle of a shotgun Virginia is not
| that poor. and Nireinians will resent
/ the charge that their government Is
| dependent for It's life on the dirty
money OF the liquor trade
How much DO these liquorites think
/ YOU Virginia gentlernent are worth In
the open SHAMELESS per capita, anyhow?
I How much do they value your man
hood and offer you cash in hand, fer
your votes? Just twenty six cents
/ head You don't look even as good
| Ar thirty cents 70 them. And for
I twenty-si cents apiece they are pro-
/ posing TO buy Your votes in favor Of
| their internal business Do you rot
| feel highly fiastered by their gem
erons valuation
| Again. they tell US ,nar the Justice
and perfection of local option is at
| stake and we must not vote for State
| wide prohibition and destroy local
| option. But when we were fighting
| and sweating blood for local option
| calling IL Just and necessary, these
| same apostles of king alcohol were
denouncing il az political heresy and
/ highway robbery under the forms Of
! law Not half a dozen of them stood
| for local option prohibition then---nor
| will they stand for II now What they
mean by local option In liquor option
/ They are for liauor anyway. always
and every way,
| InnuEurated Local Option.
! I'VE Statewiders are not the enc.
mics OF local option prohibition We
/ are about the only friends and opera
tors 1t has ever had. We inaugura,ed
1t in Virginia; we expanded it over
/ eighty Ave counties; and now We are
simply seeking to stretch 1t further
! over the other fifteen counties. max
! ing it unanimous from tidewater to
the tail-end of Lee county.
Local option Is simply the creep
/ ing paralysis with which we innocu-
( late the liquor devil until nothing Is
4 left palpitating but its weakened heart
| and then we set the heel of public
indignation upon that and crush it into
| irrevivable pulp,
| Local option Is educative. State
wide prohibition is executional. Up.
guards. and at them-give them the
! bayonet in the shape cC dry ballot,
Then they cry out that prohibition
10 fatlura and won't nrnhibit when
we get II.
I'VE will not stop to debate that