The American issue. [volume] (Westerville, Ohio) 1912-19??, 1923-10-19

tion Act the advantage is very much
on the side of the mayor and his law
department. Using the same evidence
procured by the police, which was the
basis OF license revocations, premises
involved in law-breaking can be closed
for one year. The first injunction
suits under the Illinois law were filed
by the city on October 6.
The suits, according to First AS
sstant Corporation Counsel Frank
Paden, who filed them, are intended
by Mayor Dever not only to put the
blind tigers out of business, but as
warning to property owners to make
certain that their tenants are not
running stills or peddling whisky.
Mayor Repeats Enforcement Stand
Mayor Dever's public declarations
of his purpose to uphold the law as it
is written on the books, have gone a
long ways to convince the public in
general and the lawbreakers in par
ticular that there will be no let-up in
the eafnPaig4i-to. stamp cut 1iquor iawr-
lessness in Chicago. AT banquet in
the LaSalle Hotel Mayor Dever char
acterized any one who fails to use his
power to wipe out the illicit liquor
traffic is guilty of treason.
"The miasma growing out of the IL
licit liquor traffic has reached the po-
lice department and the official life of
our federal, state and county govern
ments to such an extent that any
man who fails to stop it when it is
within his power to do so is guilty of
treason,' he declared.
81 am not going to make Chicago
dry because | want it dry. There are
times when my feelings for Mr.. Vol
stead are not what they probably
should be. But the time has come
when organized gangsters and the
outgrowth OF their operations are
threatening all our institutions.
Many are today cynical over the
situation. They have thrown up the
sponge. They say the law can't be
enforced. That is the most danger
GUS time to the safety of our govern
ment. When people don't care, gov
ernment goes to smash"
Six Captains Orsted
Six captains of police in whose dis
tricts conditions were unsatisfactory
have been asked to resign during the
past two weeks. All police officers
were warned that they could not fool
the mayor and the chief All were in
formed that they must get results or
get out. In some districts great NUM-
bers of persons were arrested in raids,
but most of them were casual cus:o-
mers instead of persons guilty of vio-
lating the prohibition statutes. The
officers who made wholesale raids and
brought in many wagonloads OF GUS
toners to the police stations were
told to bring in the proprietors of the
booze joints instead. 1t was made
clear that a police official would not
get credit for doing his duty unless he
arrested persons guilty of maintaining
saloons and selling intoxicants.
Wettest Section Closed Tight
The effect OF the dry enforcement
drive on sections of the city formerly
wettest is graphically described by the
newspapers. On Oct. the Chicago
Herald and Examiner said:
THE wettest district in Chicago
was 'deader than Dowie,' as the West
Side boys say, last night for the
first time in the history of Chicago.
This neighborhood comprises the
slave market and hobo town., from
the river to Desplaines ST., from Van
Buren to Lake St.
Its thousand or more saloons were
closed tighter than drum at sun
down last night by orders of Mayor
Dever to Chief of Police Collins.
There was woe on w. Madison ST.
as result"
The Chicago Tribune gave this re-