The American issue. [volume] (Westerville, Ohio) 1912-19??, 1917-02-09
DRY CHICAGO
BOOSTERS HOLD
NOTABLE MEETING
Three Big Speeches by Three
Big Men Show Liquor the
Energy Of Health, Business
and Good Government
WINNING FIGHT STAGED


Chicago is going dry and when
Chicago goes dry, the nation will go
dry" This was the keynote of an
unusual banquet held under the au-
spices of the Dry Chicago Federation
in the Auditorium Hotel last week,
and attended by 200 representative
citizens of Chicago. Among those
present were many leaders in the in
dustrial and professional life of the
city.
In the absence of Bishop Thomas
Nicholson, president of the Fedora
ton, who was out of the city, Judge
Robert McMurdy presided Eugene
N. Foss, three times Governor of
Massachusetts,, DR.. William A. Evans,
former Health Commissioner of Chi
cago, and Judge William N. Gemmill
of the Municipal Court were the chief
speakers.
Alcohol Has No Place n Medicine,
Says DR.. Evans
Speaking on the subject, What is
the present attitude oil the medical
profession toward the liquor ques1r
tiong Dr. Exams szf,iia-
at used to be thought that liquor
had curative effect upon tuberculo-
sis, and several other diseases. but
the latest investigations prove that
with the exception of form of dia-
betes, where a small quantity of low
per cent alcoholic liquor is sometimes
of service, the use of alcohol is strict
ly interdicted"
DIR. Evans stated that alcohol
might have some use as a drug, but
that like aconite and several other
drugs, it is so powerful as to render
its use extremely dangerous.
Referring to the amazing progress
i'll preventive medicine, DR.. Evans
said that while Boards of Health in
the larger cities used to be charv
about publishing the truth about alco-
hol, city and state Boards of Health
are today carrying on a vigorous
campaign of education, pointing out
the destructive effects of alcohol not
only upon the user himself, but upon
his children.
DR.. Evans summarized the present
attitude of the medical profession to-
ward alcoholic LIQUORS in these words:
"Alcohol has now no place in the
armamentarium of the physician"
Judge Gemmi1l, in one of the
strongest indictments ever uttered
against the liquor traffic, branding it
as a traitor to government and a
breeder of lawlessness, aroused his
hearers to high pitch of enthusiasm.
Judge Gemmill recited the history OF
the liquor traffic in America from tho
days of the whisky rebellion in Penn
sylvania TO the present time and de-
clared, There hasn't been a day
when whisky hasn't been traitor to
the laws:
Governor Foss Shows Liquor Enemy
of Business
"No man." said Governor Foss,
"who works for living and has a
family to support, can afford to drink
liquor. He gets it, as the boys say,
in the neck-he gets it going and
coming. He spends Inore than he
can afford and his efficiency is low
cred and his earning capacity de-
creased. This is primarily why we
are going to give it up in this coun-
try-why the saloon has got to go.
"If our country Is drawn into this
awful war, about the first thing our
government will have to do is to stop
the sale of liquor. We cannot both
fight we'll and drink"
Big Fight Staged
DR.. Philip w. Yarrow, superin.
tendent of the Dry Chicago Fedora
ton, disclosed enough of the plans
of the organization to show that tho
approaching fight against the saloon
in Chicago is to be the most care
fully prepared and the most hotly
contested in the history of the anti
saloon movement.