Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1921-11-02

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the bootleggers make getaway
And you jeer at Che prohibitionists
because they can not enforce their
own law. You have mysterious crates
left on your back porch in the small
|hours of the night and you pay for
it in cold cash-no checks i1for muh.' y
And furthermore, you are church
member in good and regular stand
ling, you sit high up on a Sunday, you
sing in. the choir, you sing tI love
they kingdom, Lord" and sound a
deep "Ah-men." You sing-what
lshal I call it--a spade?
You talk about nullifying the 18th
amendment, but do you know what
you are talking about? What does it
take to nullify the amendment to the
federal constitution Many of our
prominent men speak too lightly of
this law; editors, writers, speakers
and by no means least, cartoonists.
The wider the circle Of their infiu-
ence, the more damage they are do
ling, and some are positively criminal.
This law is openly discredited, it is
the fashion to fay it both fore and
aft. Men who never thought of taking
drink before will sneak into places
they've never been before and take
snip" with some fellow they never
associated with liquor before, and
then use the fact as ar argument
against the law, saying that the law
| is making men drink who had never
thought of it before. They do not
know it, but they are publishing to
the world that they were yellow after
all, and when Uncle Sam came along
and poured in a little "dry blue"
they all turned green. They just could
not stand the test, that was all
They tell you that the prohibition
lists cannot enforce their own law,
and have their little jokes on the side
about "home brew" It is not the duty
of the prohibitionists to enforce the
law, but it is> the duty of every re-
spectacle, law-abiding citizen to up
hold the officers whose business it is
to enforce it.
Start the habit of discrediting
law that doesn't suit you, and what
will keep some other man from dis
crediting one that doesn't suit him?
Keep up this movement Of lawlessness
against the prohibition law, which is
imbedded in the statutes, and you,
discredit the federal authority. Dis
credit a state law, and the injury is
local, but systematic defiance of fed
eral law strikes at the very heart of
national government. The man that
will do it is at hearta Red. This is no
obsolete or hasty enactment that
you are Haunting. Does dislike of
law justify defiance of it; does un-
popularity among the minority justi-
fly the breaking of it, or excuse len
iency upon the part of the officers of
the law and the courts? Besides,
where does all this head you? Sup
pose you should succeed in proving
that the combined laws of both state
and nation cannot prohibit the sale
of booze how then will you prove that
they can prohibit confscation?
Every American citizen who raises
his voice in defnace or derision of
the 18th amendment is exposing his
country to the ridicule of the world,
and he is traitor to the government
to which he looks for protection of
his political and property rights.
He is lawbrealser, if he sells and
a lawbreaker if he buys, but it is no
fault of the law. Break down respect
for one law and you undermine the
sanctity of all. 1t is but step be-
tween unlawful distilling and muir
der, and between unlawful selling and
robbery, and but step between un-
lawful buying and buying stolen
goods.
They tell us that about three
fourths of the officers of the law are
into the game themselves, and that
they are making ga killing"-and no.
body doubts it. Does that, mean that
three fourths of all the people in the
United States will take a bribe or
violate an oath? That can hardly be
true. Then, YOU ask, why this large
percent of such men in such respon-
sible positions? The officers of the
law of necessity must be on par
with the people who put them in Of