The Alaska citizen., 1916-06-12
Phone 262 Phone
PAY FOR WET STUFF.

The News Miner takes it very much to heart that The Citizen ac- cuses it of getting paid for it's anu prohibition utterances. It says:
 TO argue that a competitor is
 for or agalnst any public ques
 ton solely because of the money
 question is to stulttfy any news
 paper or any man who makes
 a pretense ol editing a news
 paper"
 If the News-M Miner is not to b. believed in any case. then we may be wrong in charging that il is in the pay of the liquor interests but We cannot understand just hoy even a contortionst could so Coll- pIntely turn turtle as has the News Miner without assistance of some sort, and the most powerful of all help would necessarily be the fl nancial lever.
 In an editorial printed in that pa per on Mar,h 30th Of last year deal ing with the liquor question DC cured the following sentences: All men realize this world would be better off without the saloon and There can be no hell here after which will outpoint the hell the alcoholic lives in
 These statements both go a great deal further in dealing with the liquor problem than any utterance ever made by The Citizen, even though the News Miner would class it in the prohibition ranks.
 The editor of the News Miner says The saloon men ha'en't potlatched anything 10 us. nor have the liquor associations, to encour- age us in our fight" Now 1t is bad enough 10 be so shifty that one cannot tell for twenty four hou1a at a time what policy the paper has, but to tell an absolute false hood about it is the crowning ef- fort
 While it Is none of our business, just for the sake of argument. We would ask tte editor of the News Miner if it is not fact that he has a contract with some liquor inter eSts on the Outside 10 preacA their doctrine for which he is to receive the sum of one thousand dollars? He says they have not potached anything to him but is it under stood that they are to do so some time in the future? If he is honest and will answer these questions truthfully 1t may put him right be- fore the people. who have him pie tured in their minds eye in the shape of a dollar mark
 A newspaper, as well as an indi- vidual, has the right to change it's mind upon any subject when it is convinced that it was wrong in the first instance but when the change is brought about by the in- fluence of United States currency
 
 tion except insofar as the money has caused the change.
 Whether The Citizen is in favor of prohibition or the News Miner is opposed to it from principle, it still remains a fact that the terri tory will be dry in due course of time, whether the people of the territory want 1t or not The con- gross of the United States has con sidered this change for the past four years, and not a session passes but that from one to two bills are introduced with that end in view. It is conceded that the District of Columbia, the seat of government, will go dry in the near future. or just as soon as the political con ventions are over, and when that takes place there will be absolute ly no hope for Alaska staying wet The liquor interests will suffer from the fact that their warning will be short, whereas if the people them selves voted it dry the change would not be made before 1918.