The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1915-07-09
WEST VIRGINIA SUCCEEDS IN
ENFORCING DRASTIC "DRY'LAW

in West Virginia. In an address be-
fore the national convention of the
Anti-Saloon League of America here
today, Mr.. Blue said West Virginia
had demonstrated that prohibition will
prohibit prohibition law can be
enforced, and quoted testimony from
both the employers of labor and the
heads of labor unions to the effect
improved.
He charged that the liquor interests
were spending large sums Of money
to create the impression that West
Virginia was bankrupt because she no
longer collected revenue from the liq-
uor business.
"West Virginia is not now, and has
not been, a bankrupt state" said Mr..
Blue. "The state is in as healthy a
financial condition as any state in the
union"
Referring to the recent decision of
the supreme court of the United States
the effect of which is that West Vir-
ginia shall pay to the bond-holders of
the state of Virginia the sum Of $12,-
000,0O0-which debt has been a matter
of controversy since the separation of
West Virginia from Virginia-Mr.
Blue said:
"1f we have to pay Virginia's bond
holders this sum of money, we can do
so. The state of West Virginia has
the resources to do it, and a citizen
ship that has met and solved her prob
lens as they arose. We only have to
pay the debt once. On the other hand,
before West Virginia became a dry
state there was annually sent out of
the state for intoxicating liquors the
sum of $15,000,000- ,000,000 more,
every year, than the amount Of the
adjudication in favor of Virginia's
bondholders. Such financial drain for
intoxicating liquors upon the people
Of the state went on for years and
would be going on now were it not
for the prohibition amendment and
laws pursuant thereto.
"Already the liquor interests in the
nation are publishing broadcastna-
ton wide-that West Virginia will be
sold at the front door Of the nations
capitol to pay a decree Of $12,000,-
C00.' want you to know that the
great liquor interests of the nation are
actively trying to hold out-and will
fully and falsely hold out-West Vir-
ginia to the world as a financially
troubled state-a bankrupt state-a
state that is about to be sold out
The liquor interests, through their
journals and otherwise, are misusing
West Virginia's fair name, and mis-
leading the citizens of the nation, for
the purposes, among others, Of trying
to lead the states citizens to believe
that they must go to intoxicating liq-
uors for revenue, and to deter other
states from becoming prohibition
states.
"Men, not money, are the real as
sets of a state. The happiness and
the general welfare of it's citizens are
the first obligation Of a state. The
general growing up in West Virginia,
its future men and women, will grow
into the full stature of manhood and
womanhood without knowing the open
saloon, having healthy bodies, clear
minds, and clean morals, will be worth
more to the state than all the material
wealth. Compare, if you can make
such comparison, the $65O,0O0 of an
nual revenue formerly received by the
state from the liquor business with a
generation Of boys and girls, men and
women, that knows not the saloon"