Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1915-05-31

wide magnitude, we, members OF the Uni
tartan Temperance Society. place our
hibition.'
DR.. ]. Henry Croker remarked that
he never expected to gee a prohibition
meeting under the auspices Of Uni
tarians."
But he did.
The Rev. John Haynes Holmes Of New
York city congratulated the society on Its
progressive platform-alcohol education.
national prohibition. civic clubs in place OF
the saloon.
education is necessary. Of course. because
there are still q great many men who do
not yet realize that the alcohol question has
undergone a revolution in the last %
years. Men have always been against heavy
drinking, but careful experiments made
in the laboratories of Europe have proved
that even moderate drinking impairs health
and lowers emctency.
At the meeting of the booze makers
and peddlers and their allies and tools.
the liquor interests were ably defended
and realized by Congressman James A.
Gallivan of Boston. In part he said:
~ think it high time for someone to,
swat the American people with something
to bring them to realizing sense OF what
this prohibition movement really means
what it would mean in moral and financial
loss to our country. How many of the peO-
pie who pirate SO glibly Of nationwide prohi-
bition-how many OF them DO you suppose
have the slightest conception of what 1t
means? Those people particularly VINO
20 up and down the land regulating other
peoples conduct and morals for them
know or care what the ultimate cost would
be of this monstrous evil they are trying
to foist upon us in the name OF right
eous REFORM
believe me- they are fortifying themselves
against the day Of reckoning-from that
sainted apostle of modesty and pure Eng
ish Billy Sunday down to the n% rhaxr 81
all right, but what about you and me:
Where do we get off when the millennium
comes?"
Answering his question first We
should say, as did that sainted apos-
tie of modesty and pure English, Billy
Sunday" that it would all depend on
how much cussedness and human
misery they had peddled-"for a. con-
Observation-Disclosures they would get off.
AS to chose people who go up and
down the land regulating other
peoples conduct" we wonder if the
brilliant Democratic congressman
from South Boston ever went on rec
ord as favoring sanitary restrictions of
the unthinking, uniformed, careless
or don't-care members of communi-
ties; if, he ever favored the quarantine
law for the protection of homes and
children; if he ever favored law pre-
venting persons of perverted minds
and morals from circulating lewd lit
erature and pictures or otherwise
menacing the morals and future Of
the young.
We wonder if this man Gallivan
ever thought that the saloon, Haunting
it's wares and by a thousand subtle
means injecting the minds and bodies
of the young with that hideous and
disgusting disease drunkenness, is not
quite as serious a menace to the
young and the old, to the homes and
BUSINESS lllSlltuIlOllS, do 10 oiIluiA pO<A'
diphtheria or bubonic plague.
We wonder if this man Gallivan
would rather see his son stricken with
typhoid, with the chance of rescue by
modern medical skill, or infected with
an appetite for alcohol and the strong
probability of being cheered on by
such congressman as Gallivan, by the
reckoning of saloons, by the gaiety of
social functions, by the sophistries of
liquor makers and sellers and the elo-
quent tools they hire, into the common
fate Of the drunkard:
We wonder if this man Gallivan,
who sneers at good men and women
working from a wholly unselfish mo-
tive. would rather see his daughter
afflicted with tuberculosis, with every
human agency working for her relief
and salvation, or in the grip Of the
"allied industries of the liquor bust
ness" of which he talks SO glibly-
with a rich and powerful organization
bidding for her honor, her earning
power in an unholy traffic, and her
soul.
We do not know that this man Gal
livan has son or daughter, but we
venture that he is not wholly devoid
of intelligence, justice or human feel
ing-his friends, neighbors and others
have sons and daughters whom they
would protect. His brilliant attempt
before the booze makers won applause
from those assembled; it will be wide
ly praised and quoted by the liquor
interests: it will win him votes from
the rum class--the saloons, the cheap
ward heelers, the buns of the streets
and dives-but, was it worth it?
Congressman Gallivan declared that
the butcher the baker and the candle
stick maker would lose millions of
dollars through the cutting off of
wages Of the 100000 men engaged
directly or in allied industries with the
liquor business Of this country and he