The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1923-10-22

To the Editer of The Times
Editoriaily you stated that accord
ing to Federal prohibition head
quarters, prescriptions for liquor
patients - barring Indiana which
through its State law does not allow
it-are being filed at the rate OF
$4,000 a day. You then State that
this means more than 100000
gallons, 100000 pints, or 352.000.-
600 drinks in a year. You also make
reference to the health commissioner
of Chicago, who declares that Of
$4,000 samples of liquor seized there
this year. only 500 were the genuine
article and that $50 persons have
been killed in Chicago by rank
poison" booze drunk there this year.
The above is exceedingly interest
ing, but let us seel In 1917, the
people Of this United States consumed
42,723,376 gallons Of wine That
amounted to 331 ,7S7, 00S pints, or TO-
6171S4,256 drinks.
During the same year while the
! saloon was running full blast in our
country, there were consumed 1877
74O.3 gallons Of spirituous liquors.
That amounted to 1881 ,922, 800 pints..
or Al. 621, 523, 200 drinks. 6
Yea, Think of tt
During 1917. the drinking people of
the United States consumed 1,S84,265,
ST. gallons of beer, That amounted
to 1904. 12S, O16 pints; or, if you can
divide up beer into such small
quantities as by the standard indicated
above, it meant 4S2, 371, s36,512 drinks.
Just think Of it!
Summarizing 1t, it meant that in the
year 1917, the people of the United
States Of America, who drink booze
consumed 1854, 1890 gallons of
booze of all kinds; or 1921 1882, 624
pints, which amounted to 534,610,-
643,968 drinks.
Which means, in other words, that
in 1917. 1878 drinks were consumed
to where one is consumed now.
And yet they tell us that pro
hibition does not prohibit! Reference
is made in the Times" article to $50
persons who have been killed by booze
drunk in Chicago this year.
This is interesting, but according
to Judge William N Gemell, for the
last seventeen years a Judge of the
Municipal Court Of Chicago, we are
told that in 1917 the coroners Office
of Cook County. conducted $685. in
| quests on the bodies Of persons dying
In that county under suspicious cir
cumstances.
Open Booze Joints
In 1922 the number Of inquests
under such circumstances were 8 ,S42,
or 794 fewer than in 1917 when Chi
cago had over 5000 open booze joints
and the inquest in this latter year Ing
Guided all the accidental deaths caused
by automobile smash ups, which would
have been increased many hundred
percent, but for the fact that even an
imperfectly enforced prohibition law
in Chicago is many times better than
license at It's best.
We do not have at hand the specific
figures as to the alcoholic mortality
| in Chicago However, New York
City might afford a pretty good basis
of comparison, comparatively speak
ing, with Chicago. In 1917. New York
had a total of recorded mortality from
all alcoholic cases Of $40, while in
1922 of 295, the same being a re-
duction Of As per cent And this in
spite of the fact that the city of New
York has been the capital Of all the
liquor conspiracies in the United
States.
In Halcyon Days
Talk about the poison which IN in
booze today! It certainly has about
enough, but alcohol is and always has
been a poison. People in the halcyon
days of the saloon got delirtum
tremens, died OF alcoholic poisoning,
and through diseases brought on by
alcoholism, and also through murders
for which alcohol should be charged
with the responsibility, and the deaths
by alcoholism of the old saloon days
were many hundred percent greater,
If the facts were only known. than
they are today even with prohibition
not perfectly enforced.
Maybe the editor Of The Times
might try his hand at figures again.
E. s.. SHUMAKER,
superintendent Indiana Anti-Saloon6