Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-09-11
PoISoNERS GROWING RICH
IN THE BOOTLEG COMBINES
Money.Mad Outlaws, in the Lead for the
Moment, Are Banishing All Chance
for a "lIberalIzed, Dry Act

|
for a "Liberallzed" Dry Act
NOR a demonstration Of unmitgated an
L archy you do not have to look to Russia
nowadays or tune a wireless for Emma
! Goldman or page the bomb juggers You
| need go no farther than the various groups
| of pseudo respectable voting citizens who
are saturating good many American COM
| munities with adutcrated or imitation
whisky and getting dizzily rich by an open
| and wholly cynical defiance of the laws of
| the United States.
These newer anarchists are not of the un
washed. They aren't deluded by twisted
| visions of a millennium. They themselves do
| not drink the poison s ConCoctions that are
| being handed out openly or furtively in many
barrooms hereabouts at fifty cents a dose.
| They are a codly sober crew and they are
buying houses in the country and fast
motorcars.
The question now is not of the rights or
wrongs of the Volstead act. It does not re-
late to the wisdom or unwisdom of absolute
prohibition. What normal minded people
are beginning to ask is whether q handful Of
thugs and illiterates can really be permitted
to make the federal authorities and the
constitutional laws appear foolish If they
can. there is no reason why counterfciting
should not become a profitable vocation or
why any laws should be generally respected.
Outlawry, inspired by prehensie greed, has
kept the whisky business going. Prctcnscs
and concealments are being abandoned. The
traffic is open.
1t has been matter of common knowledge
for months that the saloons in Camden were
on the old basis of open red EYE openly
arrived at. The raids directed by Prose
cutor WOlverton might have been made
months ago had his plans been completed.
The political machinery of Camden is
pretty closely knit in with the social and
business life of the city. 1t was rumored
that the saloon owners received assurances
of immunity from somewh re higher up.
The addresses of Governor Edwards helped
largely TO inspire general disregard of the
prohibition laws and in Camden. as in this
city, it is generally believed that the gov
ernment is being double crossed.
Conditions in many parts of Philadelphia
are similar to those that finally caused Mr..
Wolverton to turn the local police into fields
where federal agents were inactive or in
efficient. If raids were possible in Camden
they are possible here.
The survivors in the liquor business are
men of the sort who made the saloon de-
tested and hated. There were men and firms
in the brewing and distiling business who
quit decently when the prohibition amend
ment went into effect. An inherent sense
of honor made it impossible for them to
break a federal law-even a federal law
which they called unjust.
The men who had no scruplcs arc rolling
in wealth-for the time being.
What is to be the final result of this
orgy? For an answer to that question it
is only necessary to read between the lines
in the statement issued the other day by
Mr.. McAdoo, who. to the aStOnshment of
many Of his associates in the Democratic
party, expressed definite opposition to any
revision of the Volstead act
McAdoo is the first politician of acknowl.
edged influence to express a belief that has
been made general in both big parties by
the shameless violations of a law written
on the federal statute books. If a light
wine and beer law could be used as shield
for a general traffic in more or less poison
Gus whisky it would. Of course. arouse gen
eral opposition. That a revised Vol,tead
act would serve further to intrench and
encourage the combines that have openly
houted the laws and traod corruption amid
the mechanism of federal and municipal
police organizations is now pretty generally
admitted.
MCAdoo contends that the whisky bust
ness-now far more dangerous than It ever
was becaus" it cannot be regulatcd-Caunot
be wiped out until every saloon is eliminated
and until the government appropriates large
sums not only for prohibition enforcement
but to insure continuing respect for its own
authority. Multitudes of people who we're
by no means fanatical prohibitionists have
come to feel a sense Of outrage in the pres
enCc of n phenomenon that spells ContpmDt
among aggressive illiterates for the institu-
tionS Of government in this country.
The matter will not be left to the nOIiti.
clans Before long public opinion viii de.
mand angrily that every remaining saloon
be wiped out. All possibility of a mtigatod
prohibition law appears to have vanished
already.
Meanwhile the bootcgginG combinations
have the best Of it. They have moro money
than the government agencies established to
fight them because their profits have been
enormous. Mixtures paraded as whisky
are sold over bars in this and other cities
| at a profit that sometimes reaches q full
| 10000 per cent. Some of the stuff is pois
| onoUs. Some Of it is doped. All whisky
| smuggled from bonded warehouses to the
open market is diluted first and then fur
| ther thinned out with unknowable concoc-
| tions.
| More or less casual efforts have been made
| TO obtain direct evidence against wholesale
| violators who control the Illicit business.
| Thus far, however, only the petty Offenders
| figure in the lists of raids and arrests.
| The federal agents themselves cOmnlaiD
| of a lack of money and facilities. Prece-
| dents established by successive court de-
cisons certainly have made their work more
| difficult by acquiring evidence that in every
| prosecution shall be final, absolute and un-
| mistakable Most prosecutions instituted by