The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1916-03-07
Ex-Gov. Hanly Gives Force
full Address on the Liq-
uOr Question
RUM TRAFFIC DEFIES
SOVEREIGNTY OFLAW
Defiance of Law Imperils Government
Address Masterpiece of oratory and
Filled with Epigrammatic Utterances
Large Audience.

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Tackling the question of prohibition
from the standpoint of its effect upon
government, painting the pictures of
the results of the liquor traffic upon
the sovereignty of the nation, ex-
Gov. J. Frank Hanly of Indiana held
last evening the closest attention of
a large audience in the Auditorium.
His lecture, masterpiece of orator
zeal architecture and delivery, was
filled with epigrammatic utterances
that in some instances were startling
iii their sting and always keen enough
to puncture the cloak of indifference.
George L. Durham presided and in
troduced the speaker, after Leitsing
er 8 orchestra had entertained FIR
half an hour with musical selections.
Ev-GOv. Hanly said that every gener-
alton faces one great racial problem
Our forefathers solved the question of
kingcraft 139 years ago, but, having
ended that on this continent. were
unable to solve the slave problem
They were great enough to give free
dom to themselves but not great enough
to give it to the bondmen.
The abolition of slavery was the
next great crisis, but the government
at Washington that abolished slavery
became a partner in the liquor traffic
We are now reaping the whirlwind in
the 100000 men and women convicted
of crime in this country, $4,000 of
whom are the direct victims of the
traffic.
He said that in the four years he
was governor of Indiana he reviewed
the evidence in more than 600 cases
appealed to him for executive clemen-
cy and in more than rs per cent of
them the liquor traffic was the real
criminal
1--WE are reaping the whirlwind in
human ineffieiency, mental, physical
and economical at an hour when
events of the world have made us the
trustee of the civilization of the
race.
OF 1000 children now in institutions
in his state, more than $50 of them,
according to the records, are children
of drunken parents. 1--WE ought not
to legalize the thing that despoils tn !
childhood of free people.
We are reaping the whirlwind, he
said, in the dissolution of the govern
ment of cities. For over a years in
Chicago, until few weeks ago, there
had not been a mayor who enforced
the law as to the closing of saloons
on Sundays. The mayors have been
| men whose lips were blistered with
official perjury because they swore tc
enforce the laws which the liquor in.
| terests defied them to enforce When
the present mayor did not enforce the
Sunday closing law 10000 men and wo
men marched the streets in protest
| against the closing of the saloons Sun.
| days.
There is no sovereignty in this lane
except the sovereignty of law No law
can be defed long without importing
government. Recently there has beer
a man going about the state who ad
mitted that for the period of five year:
when he was mayor of a city in Main,
| he did not enforce the law. He admit
ted publicly that the liquor traffic wa.
| greater than his sovereignty.
He said that there is a city in hi
state where the government has entire
| ly dissolved, for all of the principal of
ficials are behind the federal bars. TIL,
] federal judge said to them in sentenc
ing them that the liquor traffic wa
back of their crime and 1--WE canno
much longer tolerate its interference,
with government.
| The influence of this traffic on gov
eminent is the basic, underlying issue
he declared The traffic openly defe
the people in Vermont in published