The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-02-15
MENDMENT IS BLOW AT UNION
Passage Will Result in Great Amount of Glass
 Discussion.

The Prohibition Amendment Is an essential blow at the Union, and its passage will result in more class dig Sehslon In the next two years than anyone has thought, declared Jas M Beck last night to 250 members and guests of the American Defense League and American Rights Union, who gathered in the Astor Gallery Of the Waldorf-Astoria to pay tribute to MT. Beck as 8 prophet of preparedness ana as one who had contributed largely to the awakening of America to her duty In the war.
 MT. Beck's attack on the amend ment, which, he said, he made with out any discussion of the merits Of prohibition itself. was greeted with great applause.
 After defining the amendment as an attempt to regulate the personal habits of individuals and thus an in frigement of one Of the Constitution's basic principles namely the right of home rule, the speaker declared that It's ratification constituted one of the deadliest assaults ever made on the Constitution of the United States. After the appreciation which was giv- en this had somewhat subsided, he leaned forward earnestly and said:
 If l had a message to deliver to- night I would make 1t this: America. wake up and defend the institutions of your country as defined and ex- pressed in the Constitution of the 1 United States
 These are grave times, and who can tell what the next five years may produce? We must not hold to the | abstracts of visionaries, but must hold to the things which came to us from our fathers. Have you appre- ciated how far Bolshevism can go In | two years In this country? Suppose we have here long bread lines, sup ! pose we have men coming homo to whom death and struggle have been 1 commonplaces for some time, sup pose the light of anarchy flares forth | here-1 tell you we would be in far worse plight than was Great Britain in respect to the Albert Hall aff1ir'' the conclu ling words being a refer enoe to the threat of Socialists to tie 1 up London on water and lights should the authorities refuse use ot the hall, an incident which provoked q a. serious crisis in British life. Time for Caution.
 I've must so govern that there Is no privileged class in the nation and that all, capitalist and manual toiler alike, are but the different parts ot an orchestra and that only by playing together as good musicians can the 1 symphony of progress be played. We | must revive faith in the institutions | of our country, under which we have l grown great, and especially Tn the | supreme compact, the Constitution o1 the United States. It, as all political institutions, depends upon public i opinion.
 ''It has already been partly destroy ed. because public opinion failed tc defend 1t. Its main pillars are stil intact. Let them perish, and our form of government will be as the Parthe- pon, a beautiful ruin, admired by al | the ages, but sti1l 9 ruin. In the las ten years that noble edifce has beer slowly undermined. Nnly a few day. ago its basic principle of home rule 1T all matters, not of purely federal con. cern sustained 9, deadly assault.
 ''The best hope of true democracy is in the perpetuity of the form 0: government which our fathers gavt us. Let that be destroyed, and thu fairest heritage of man will be gone
 Men of all parties in these trying an:
 terrible days should unite to defent
 the sacred heritage of our fathers
 which wisely kept the power of gov ernment within its true orbit by con
 stitutional Limitations" - New Yorl ! Times.