The Topeka state journal., 1919-10-31
"Dry" America Amazes World


Lesson"-Jeremiah s5:1-S, 12-14a.
1919.
"Dry' America Amazes World
Often during the present year my
4 fellow traveller and 1 have talked to-
gether of the incredulity which we
found in the old world concerning
Americas adoption of a nationwide
prohibition law. We have sought to
understand why foreign friends could
not comprehend 1t. Much amuseme ent
we have had out of our countless con-
versations with these bewildered in
quirers-and also m Ich food for seri-
GUS reflection. Practically every Eng
disappearing person we met talked
about this wonder of the world. 1t
was more consistently a theme of dis
cussion than the peace treaty, the war
itself or the influenza epidemic. 1 can
testify that all the civilized world is
deeply interested in Americas going
dry"
Many men. especially British Off
GERS, were sincerely concerned lest
there should be a revolution in Amer
lea! They fully expected the work
ing classes" to rise up in armed pro-
test against being deprived of their
beer. Their basic assumption was that
certain weird reformers and fanatics,
possessed of sudden unaccountab BILE
authority. had taken advantage of the
VI the SDlul0fS America
to put this terrible prohibition law
upon the statute books. And what
would become of the country? Men
! surely would not submit patiently to
being deprived of their drink.
Clearly Europes mind is not our
mind. The thing roots deeper than
the difference between the drinking
habits of America and, say, Great
Britain. The sophisticated old world
could not understand our prohibition
measure, enacted from a self-denying
sohcitude for the common welfare any
more than it can understand our mo-
| tlVes in entering the war To this
day, there are millions of persons east
OF the Atlantic who are waiting to see
| what the United States will get out
OF the war; and who, in the meantime,
attribute all sorts of ignoble motives
TO her. They think that Canada and
Australia, who share Americas ideals.
| somehow had to enter the war, be-
cause they belonged" to the British
empire. If we faced this difference in
viewpoints frankly, we might get far
| ther IN understanding the present
| world conditions. Idealism Seems re
pc IN peculiar degree the possession
| OF the newer, younger nations The
simple neighborliness of pioneers has
worked out in real spirit of broth er
mood and social service.
| Bigger Than Booze.
There is no denying that Eurone
mas been given a jolt by the drastic
/ temperance legislation of the United
States and Canada. And the Moslem
East has been arrested in it's new fole
| lowing OF the European fashion of al
coholic indulgence. The frantic man
ner in which advocates of strong drink
are defending it is one portent of the
not-distant day when the whole world
viii be dry" After the British home
1 hnw ~ 49,
the part that whisky played in the
! tragic loss of certain great battles and
| positions, they will take measures to
prevent at least the higher officers
from capitulating to the bottled enemy
who is always a powerful ally of every
| other enemy.
Back of this all lies an idea that
| IS greater than the liquor question
That is the notion that whatever hurts
persons efficiency, or nations, is
| not TO be tolerated; and that whatever
makes for selfishness and unbrotherli-
ness is fundamentally bad for eff
cheney and for life. We cannot run
this world on a '1ook- out-for- number
| one basis. We are all too tightly tied
up in the one bundle for that Now
adays we are glimpsing a vast signifi-
canoe in the Interpretation of the full
filment of Christ's principles as we
read Bear ye one another's burdens.
| and so fulfill the law of Christ" We
| are outlaws from the kingdom of
| heaven so long as we are not sharing
the other persons load. Not to have
! load on our shoulders declas sses us, as
| it were; puts US out of the good society
of the good. Looked at in the large,
the liquor question is more than an
! economic question and a social ques-
tion and a physiological question: it is
religious question.
| Observation-Disclosures
For decades the Sunday schools
! l,,r ~,
| Temperance Sunday" This lesson
recognizes that anniversary; that is
| why we treat it topically, rather than
| textually-altho the Rechabite are
well worth studying about. There will
| be the note of jubilation in this years
celebration; for we have witnessed
the greatest demonstration of the
| advantages of the suppression of the
| liquor traffic the world has ever seen.
| Some drinkers are still grumbling of
| course;i but they are not drinking as
Of yore, so who minds the grousing?
| Queer stories of all kinds are cur
rent since the United States went
dry" Thus, the House of Correc-
tion Farm in Philadelphia has not
had enough I'd. d. d.'s''-''drunk and dis.
orderly'"-to carry on it's farm, or to
run the plant which supplies the COM
munity with gas; and both of these
calamities have been heralded as evils
| of prohibition Mr.. Blythe tells in
The Saturday Evening POST of
| workingmen who now are so sober
and flush" on Monday morning that
they do not care whether they work
| or not; they have money so why
labor?. In the old days, the bene-
ficent saloon kept them SO poor that
| they had to work. Also a steam
! laundry complained of being swamp
ed with business, because so many
! wives are now using the husbands
! booze money to pay for the family
| wash, instead of doing it themselves
None of the dire prophecies of the
| brewers have been fulfilled: and the
| people generally are better off and