Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-12-23
UPSHAW CHALLENGE
To OFFICIALS WHO
DRINK CAUSES STIR
PerpIexing Phase of Prohi
Enforcement Forced Into
Open-Use of Liquor at
Capital "0pen" Secret
BY DAVID LAWRENCE
Leased Wire Service to The JournaL)
(CoDyrirht 1921

sentative UpSnaW SpeeCH CdliAii b
upon all officials Of the United
States government as well as the
governors of the states to take the
dry oath themselves, has tended to
bring into the open one OF the most
perplexing phases Of the entire pro
hibition question.
For it is an open secret that al
though prohibition is the law OF the
land and the national capital is the
center of law enforcement and re-
spect for the statutes, the use or
liquors in private parties ATTENDED
by officials, high and low, is not
frowned upon. There is clash be.
tween public duty and private sentl-
ment.
Mr.. Upshaw, of Georgia, is the
first to challenge that attitude OF
officials which seeks to Impose the
prohibition law in the abstract sense
while countenancing the use OF
liquor I'M private. No intoxicants are
served on the tables Of high officials
il any public functions, but as the
Washington Post, an administration
newspaper, said not long ago, "a
census shows there are about SOU
bootleggers in the District of Co.
lumbia and now if we could only
have a census. of their private Gus
TONER'S" The fact of considerable
drinking of intoxicants is not denied.
Within the Law
But the law does not prohibit
drinking. Officials who use liquors
can very well say there lis no re-
striction in the constitution or the
statutes against the use of liquors or
even their purchase, but simply their
manufacture and sale. The question
raised by Mr.. Upshaw, Of Georgia, is
that officials should, however, set an
example and refuse to buy any
liquors. So far as stopping the boot
logger trade, the cutting off of the
national capitals supply of illicitly
sold liquors would be a mere trifle
in the bootlegging trade of the coun-
try.
The theory of Mr.. Upshaw and
the other drys who do not like to
see government officials drinking at
all is that they will be better able
to enforce the law if they privately
believe in it's enforcement. There
are "wets" who think just the op-
posite, namely, that if government
officials found themselves absolute
ly cut off from all liquor supply they
would better understand the public
sentiment of those localities where
the liquor laws are openly Haunted
by state officials as we'll as the most
prominent citizens of the communi-
ty.
William Jennings Bryan is one Of
the few who have been in official
life not only to champion the dry
cause publicly, but to practice what
he preached. He used to keep a
book on hand so that any of his
friends could sign the dry pledge
whenever the impulse moved them.
1t has frequently been charged that
many so-called drys in the h Use
and senate who voted for the Vol.
stead act as we'll as the eighteenth
amendment have kept a private sup
ply of liquor since in their homes or
in their offices.
Lawmakers Are Stirred
One local newspaper not so long
ago won a good deal of ill-will on
Capitol hill by publishing photo
graphs of empty liquor bottles car
ried away from congressional build
ings by the garbage man from time
to time. There are, of course. HIM
dreds of employees in the capitol
other than those who have a vote
and there is no certainty that any
or all the bottles came from the
legislators themselves.
But the presumption of Mr.: Up
shaw that officials are not doing all
they might themselves to discourage
bootlegging in the District of Co.
lumbia, even though the enforce
ment officers are zealously trying to
root them out, will ever be the sub
ject of controversy as between
vets and drys here. AS usual with
prohibitionists, there is little proof.
1t is all surmise. but he would be
an untruthful reporter who didn't
agree that there is much in what
Mr.. Upshaw says about the attitude
of many officials toward enforce.
ment of the prohibition laws.