The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1915-02-24
CHARGES HEAPED
INEXCISE QUIZ
Anti-Saloon League President
Has Long List Of Allega-
tons Against Board.
SAYS LAW WAS VIOLATED
Saloons Said to Be Conducted Neal
Churches-Nude Pictures
in Cafes.

How the District Anti-salcon League
believes the District Excise Board has
failed properly to enforce the Jones'
Works excise law was told yesterday by
Andrew Wilson. president Of the league,
at the first hearing of the committee of
five Senators designated by the Senate
to investigate the workings Of the Ex-
else Board and law In the National Cap
HAL
Mr.. Wilson made long list Of charges
against the Excise Board, some definite
some vague. and some mere intimations,
and his testimony seemed to be the out
line OF the more specific charges that
Albert +. Shoemaker. attorney for the
Anti-saloon League. is expected to pre-
sent. The allegations by Mr.. Wilson
may be summed up as follows:
THE Excise Board, in drawing up its
rules and regulations for procedure, did.
in some degree. violate the excise law.
THE Excise Board. broadly speaking,
did exercise it's discretion as far as
possible on the side of the liquor in
terests.
Cites Transfers of License.
"A fragrant instance of the excise
boards violation of the law was the
transfer of liquor license to Louise
Gordon. at 407 . street northwest.
after the death of her husband. John
Gordon, when the license had ceased
to exist under the law and could not
legally be transferred.
THE Excise Board permits a beer
depot to be conducted on the edge of
the one-mlle limit of Soldiers Home.
Part of the beer depot really is with
in the restricted section. although the
entrance of the beer distributing depot
is without the mHe limit The depot
is used for wholesale distribution of
beer by an out-of-town distillery.
The Excise Board granted a large
number of licenses to saloons within
400 feet of schools and churchs In vio-
lation of the excise law. An instance
was the granting of a license to Shriner's
barroom. in Fourteenth street. within
80 feet of the New York Avenue Pres
byterian Church. Another instance was
the granting Of license to a saloon
less than 400 feet from the entrar,
Eastern High Scnool.
THE Excise Board granted licenses to
wholesale liquor stores in residence sec
tons. An instance was the granting of
a license to a wholesale place in Fourth
street northwest near the intersection of
New Jersey avenue.
THE Excise Board violated the law
by granting a license for Costello's
across the street from a Jewish syna-
gogue. to one or two saloons less than
400 feet from Central Union Mission,
and to a saloon at First and F streets
southwest. about 100 feet from a place
OF public worship"
Mr.. Wilson charged that the excise
law has been violated in the barroom
of the st. James Hotel, where pictures
of a nude woman and another picture
of nude mermaid have hung upon the
wall. He said the hotel management
was warned to drape the pictures and
did so drape them as to make the
pictures more suggestive than ever"
Mr.. Wilson said: "In my opinion Miller
Brothers are operating a bar at Four
teenth street and Pennsylvania avenue
northwest in violation OF the law. They
changed their entrance around the corner
so that patrons enter by Fourteenth
street and were granted a license
Mr.. Wilson said that when Attorney Jo-
seph Sheehy was chairman of the Ex-
else Board. Sheehy had told him (Wilson)
that II would be an outrage to grant
a saloon license to a place in the Evans
Building" Mr.. Wilson said: yet after
Sheehy resigned from the board he and
W. F. Columbus represented one Nc
Carthy, who was granted a transfer of a
license from the southwest to the Evans
Building