, 1922-08-02
RUMSEY WOULD DEBATE
DRY ISSUE WITH PROHIS
CONTINUED from Page ~

election
Two a ago l made the following
announcement: This is not a cam
paign of parties or personalities but
one of principles and Americanism. It
is NO time for diplomacy, compromise
or equivocation- 1t is time for the
truth"
1 reaffirm these truths to be self
evident: THAT all men r created
equal; that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain ~inalienable
rights; that among these are life, lib
erty," etc.
Therefore, l not only demand the
states and personal rights. but also
the repeal Of the tyrannical 18th
Amendment. Tyrannical because it
deprives all men of their ~inalienable
and natural rights; Tyrannical be-
cause we are compelled. by force,
against our wills, to think n act in
our personal tastes and habits as an
organized minority would have us.
LAWS LII not only not justified by
the will OF any organized minority, but
mo- even by the will of any organized
minority unless they be founded upon
righteousness" AS David Jayne Hill
has aptly observed-.The fundament-
al question is, therefore, how far may
some individuals rightly enforce their
own private will upon other individ-
uals? 1t makes no practical differ
ence whether hat suppression Of the
Individual is effected by one or a few
or a majority of his fellow beings,
Invested of his rights. When the
State does this, no matter what the
form of government may be, it be-
comes despotic, and this tyranny
should be regarded as odious."
!. A man exercises his ~inalienable and
natural rights when he chooses to be-
come a Prohibitionist: / claim exactly
the same right and privilege when l
choose not to become one! Can one
man enjoy this right and the other be
deprived of it? If so, by what process
of reason and justice? There never
was and never will be Righteousness
and justice in depriving men Of their
natural rights and liberties. Might
never has or will make right. We
condemn Bolshevism for its confisca-
ton of real and personal property.
But is not that a worse form Of Boil
shevism which co~nfiscates real and
personal rights? II we must have
busybodies, pseudo-reformers, bigots
and fanatics so SOLICITORS and concern
ed for the morals and goodness of
their fellow-man, let them see to 1t
rather that all men get their just and
lawful rights, rather than scheming,
plotting and terrorizing spineless leg
islators into making oppressive laws
to deprive other men of the rights and
liberties they claim for themselves,
The n makes for contenment, civili-
cation and progress. The other for
strikes, revolutions and wars. Morals
are one thing, liberty another. You
may have morals with liberty and
rights, but certainly not morals with
out them.
You cannot legislate and police peo-
pie into the Kingdom of Heaven, all
attempts of quack reformers to the
contrary Notwithstanding Can't make
make people temperate by intemper
ate laws! I'M therefore utterly OPP
posed to the regulation OF personal
morals and habits by legislation and
the interposition of the government as
a controller of mems lives.
do not and never have advocated
the saloon or drunkenness, but l do
advocate temperance with respect to
thought and laws as we'll as drink. l
90 not advocate free license, but or
dered, regulated and lawful rights
n liberties. Resistance to tyranny
is obedience to Law and obedience to
law is liberty"
Today, after two years, being more
convinced than aver as t the truth of
the above principles / can only re-
peat, with added emphasis, that prohi-
bition is not only unjust, tyrannical
and an utter farce, but a disgrace to
the character and intelligence of the
American people.
While drunkenness is one form of
intemperance, prohibition is certainly
another. In the words of Abraham
Lincoln, Prohibition will work great
injury to the aus of temperance. 1t
is a species of intemperance within it.
sf, for it goes beyond the bounds OF
a in that it attempts to control
a mans appetite by Legislation and
makesa crime out of things that are
not crimesl A prohibition law strikes
which III government was founded"
Lincoln surely had as great "a
pacity for right thinking as the pro
hibition leaders Messrs. Wheeler,
johnson, LIZ Einstein and wadeil
The active champions OF prohibition