Newspapers / Wilmington Morning Star (Wilmington, … / Feb. 4, 1923, edition 1 / Page 6
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Confession of Prohibitionist Formerly on the “Wet”.Side Describes Three Jolts Which Changed Him Into a “Dry”; Re suits Accumulating in Support of Principal of Total Abstin ence; More a Social Than an Individual Issue Men are not always born prohibition ists. Some of the* are made. At leas it is so with one man, who avows = previous anti-prohibition existencj with all its attendant intolerances toi the ilk of pussyfooters. This man stepi forth, fearless of the stigmatizing ap pellation of ‘■turncoat,’' with the clar Ifyingr statement: “I was aroused fronr my comfortable resting- place a se' ries of violent jolts caused by cC7, with some very stubborn facts. Th< Jolts were three in number and appar ently were sufficiently shattering tc turn the mind of a scholar, who ha-: belonged for many years to the le alone sschool” toward the world oi teetotalers. When a student of economics anc ■oeial policy, Henry W. Farnam, pro fessor of economics at Yale university who today backs up his “Confessions with unimpassioned arguments.t' ook or the color and tone of his teachers maxim, “Mind your own business.' This teacher, William Graham Sum mer, the -well known economist, appliec it to the liquor jproblem as to othei problems. He said that Nature hac terrible —ays of dealing with the vice ful, and ‘hat the drunkard in the gut ter’ was where he' ought to be; alsc tnat some peuyie u*v— various reasons to become teetotalers wanted to pass a law which woule compel everybody else to become a tee totaler. So far as he was concerned the matter took care of itself. Mr Farnam pays this master-teacher the compliment of being a real inspiration, and of having done notable work i" exposing the evils of the protective tariff and inflation. But he disagreed radically with him in his laissez faire doctrine. If, as Sumner held, the drunkard was always to be found in the gutter, well and 's'ood, says Mr. Farnam, who be gan his studies of the evils of liquor traffic in 1S93, but as he is most times found at the wheel of an automobile, as a worker in a factory, or as a father of a family, the hazard is too great to permit of acquaintance in the easy pol icy of tire let alone school. This is, o( course, a comfortable doctrine as well as a dangerous doctrine, but the author of "Confessions of a Prohibitionist," at that time did not see why he, himself, who only drank moderately, should be restricted in his liberty. The three jolts have convinced him that he should. The First Jolt "Jly first jolt came when, as a mem ber of the committee of fifty, I began to learn something of the social aspects of the liquor problem. This committee carried on its work for about ten years, from 1893 to 1903. It was a rather re markable group. It had among univer sity presidents such men as President Eliot of Harvard. President How of Co lumbia. and President Gilman of Johns Hopkins. It had among its physiolo gists such men as Professor Welch of John Hopkins, Professor Chittenden of Yale, Professor Bowditch of Harvard, and Dr. John 3. Billings. It numbered among its economists and statisticians such men as President Francis A. Walker of the Institute of Technology, and Carroll D. Wright of the ^depart ment of labor in Washington. The committee was divided into a number of sub-committees, one on physiologi cal aspects, one on legal aspects and one on economic aspects. 1 was the secretary of the latter committee, and our work consisted mainly in making a detailed study of the effect of liquor upon pauperism and crime. This was carried on through a case study of some 56,000 individuals, and it extended over a period of more than a year. "I must say that it was a revelation to me, and I think to the others, to find in our study that pauperism was directly attributable to the liquor habit in the case of 26 per cent of those who came under the observation of our charity organization societies, of 37 per cent of the paupers in almshouses, and of 46 per cent of the negelcted children who became public charges. In the study of crime we pursued a careful course, realizing how difficult it is to assign a criminal action to a single cause. We therefore asked whether the liquor habit contributed toward a crime as a first, second or third cause, and we found that it appeared as a pri mary cause in 31 per cent of the cases recorded and as one of the causes in 50 per cent. When we began our inves tigations I think that we were all un der the belief that the statements made by many of the agitators for prohibi tion were grossly exaggerated. Our statistics showed that some of these statements were exaggerated, but they also showed that the facts ascertained by the most careful and conservative methods were so bad that they needed no exaggeration. The facts themselves forced us to sit up and take notice.” The report of this and sub-commit tees showed conclusively, not only the degenerative effect of alcohol upon tis sues and vitality, but also exposed some of th§ fallacies regarding the beneficial effects of alcohol. One of the conclusions reached was that “al cohol drinks of all kinds are worse than useless to prevent fatigue or the effects of cold." Total abstinence was not advocated, but the committee did hold that if taken habitually liquor should be taken only at meals, prefer ably at the last meal of the day. Mr. Farnam in his pamphlet points out that medical science has now gone much, further and that the American Medical association has formally put itself on record as saying that it “op poses the use of alcohol as a beverage,” and that “the use of alcohol as a the rapeutic agent should be discouraged.” It is of interest to note, as pointed out by Mr. Farnam, that there were no prohibitionists on that early commit tee and few teachers and the majority appeared to feel that if drinking could be practiced in moderation extreme measures would be unnecessary. One of the members, Bishop Henry c. Pot ter, of New York, was sufficiently cour ageous to open a saloon which was to uphold the standard of moderate drink ing. The “Subway Tavern” did not pay and was sold to a man who was said not only to have understood the liquor traffic, but also to have had a keen sense of humor. He plastered his walls with the slogans: “They sang the Dox ology when they opened the place; we’ll sing ‘Here’s to good old wine;’” “You cannot boom drink and temper ance too;” “Running a saloon by tell ing people of the deadly effects of rum is like telling a man to please buy poi TUBERCULOSIS ur. criass nas positive proor . that he is able to cure Tu ji berculosis by Inhalation, Q In any climate. Dr. Glass 3 Is the originator in this * treatment, having discov ered It in the -year 1888. Beware of imitators. For further information ad - areas, The T. P. GLASS INHALANT CO. Maaonlc Building JLoa (Angeles, California son because the undertaker needs tne money.’’ An editorial in commenting upon the failure of the temperate sa loon, stated that it proved that “the saloon-keepers' profit was drawn largely from illegal sales, adulterated sales and drinking to excess.” His Second Jolt Still unconvinced even after his com mittee’s reports showed the increased liquor consumption per capita. Mr. Farnam received his second jolt during the World war. According to the “Confessions “More than 100,000,000 bushels of grain were used in 1917 in the produc tion of liquor. Professor Alonzo Tay lor estimated that after making every allowance for the by-products of brew ing and distilling used as animal food, we wasted enough grain to give a one pound loaf of bread every day to every soldier in an army of 11,000,000 men. “We also found that our liquor bill was appalling. The conservative esti mate of the American Grocer showed that in 1915-16 we spent $1,600,000,000 on alcoholic drinks. Other estimates Went as high as $2,000,000,000. Taking the more moderate figures only, our liquor bill was just about equal to the value or an me uieiai^ iuliuuuiS and silver, produced in the United I States in one year. It was nearly dou ble the value of coal, anthracite and bituminous. It was more than double bur government disbursements In 1915 1916, and it was two and a half times the passenger receipts of the railroads. “The injurious effect of liquor on production was felt on account of the importance of speeding- up the manu facture of munitions of war. As chair man of the community labor board I I came across a very practical illustra tion. A key man in one of our indus tries, who made one small part of one ■ of the implements of war, was in the habit o* going oiran occasional spree. Whenever he went on a spree, work on all of the other parts of this product was held up because of the lack of the one part which he made, j “I also realized to my dismay that I the optimism which I had expressed in 1899 was not justified. It was no longer true that light drinks were displacing heavy drinks. When we began our in vestigation in 1893 the country was consuming yearly on an average of 1.37 gallons of distilled spirits and 15.20 gallons of malt liquors per capita, (n 1913. the year before the "World war broke out, we were consuming 1.51 I gallons of distilled liquors and 20.72 I gallons of malt liquors. In other words, •while malt liquors had increased about 36 per cent, distilled liquors had in creased about 10 per cent." Mr. Farnam said he did not become an advocate of natonal prohibition at 1 first because he realized the corruption j of public officials which had been as sociated with state prohibition. How J ever, as conceded by this author, state j prohibition in 1917 -was a very different (thing from state prohibition In 1897. j But like many other serious-thinking i citizens, he was averse to extending j the power of the federal government land above all to putting into the con j stitution a piece of social legislation. ISays Mr. Farnam: “I was still letting j my old horse ‘laissez-faire’ lead me on. I though I was beginning to suspect that I he did not know where he was coming out." j The third jolt was when national i prohibition became an issue. Mr. Far nam did not feel that, with his first I hand knowledge of the liquor traf i flc, he could longer stand on the side lines. The arguments of those opposed I to prohibition were carefully studied i by this authority. And it was found that those writers who wielded the most Influence locally stressed the vio lation of personal liberty. Yet, ,as pointed out by the present chief justice of the United States, it Is perfectly in accordance with our laws to invad^ personal liberty if there is sufficient public reason for that invasion." Mr. Farnam speaks of these emphasizers i of personal liberty as starting at the “top of a logical toboggan slide which will soon land them in anarchy." He says it is no more of a violation to close saloons entirely than it is to close them on Sunday or at a certain hour of the day. Mr. Farnam claims to see philosophical anarchy at the bottom of the toboggan Blide down which oppo nents of the eighteenth amendment are moving, and rather than join this group he has come out strongly as a supporter of the amendment in spite of difficulties and evils in connection with it. Protecting the Innocent Passing on to another argument, that people cannot be made temperate by law, Mr. Farnum claims that liquor laws are not intended to make people temperate, as temperance is a quality Beyond the Bounds of Experimentation WHITE ROSE and TIDAL WAVE FLOUR Gilbert Grocery Co. Wholesale Grocers "I MADE-IN-CAROLINA PAINTS Buy Home Products ATLANTIC PAINT and VARNISH WORKS (Incorporated) Wilmington, N. C. l __,1 USE STAR WANT ADS CYCLONE MACK * Noted evangelist who begins a series of meetings at Calvary Baptist church this morning at 11 o'clock. With the exception of Billy Sunday, no evangelist of recent years has attracted such nation-wide attention as the Ilev. Baxter F. McLendon. He is a member of Calvary church. of mind which can only be cultivated by moral methods. But that we can protect the innocent against the drinker ! himself by checking the traffic which! fattens upon his weakness. “Another argument.’’ continues the prohibitionist, “is that prohibition cre ates a contempet for law. 1 deny the statement. It does not create lawless ness, merely reveals it. Bet me illus trate my meaning by an example. I once had a friend who seemed to be the picture of health. He was ruddy, ath letic and apparently able to do any thing. But one day as he was walking up a moderately steep hill h^ suddenly, felt distressed. He was o^iged to go home, and his physician diagnosed a disease of the heart from which he died in a few years. The hill did not create heart disease, but it revealed it. It showed that even the moderate exer tion involved was too much for a heart that was impaired. The Volstead act has, I regret to say, revealed a lawless spirit in quarters where it was not sus pected. “This is, however, but one Ulustra-' tion of the humiliating fact that we are asr a nation lawless in comparison with other civilized countries. If we now find people violating the eighteenth amendment who have been hitherto! law-abiding citizens, we must conclude i that they have never faced a tempta- j tion as strong as that which the amend- | ment presents. That does not prove that the law is wrong in itself. We | find our marriage laws disregarded by j rich society people who lead double | lives. This does not prove that monog amy is wrong, it simply proves that there are individuals who are ready for their own gratification to violate the I marriage law. The crucial question, then, with regard to prohibition is, not whether all decent people approve of it, but whether it has produced the social effects that were intended. We ask, in other words, whether it has diminished in any degree the evils of pauperism, crime, disease an<fc waste which were found to result from the consumption of liquor. ; Kffcctft of Prohibition * “The criminal statistics of the United 1 States are not available in any com- | plete form, but such figures as have i been obtained from various cities and States agree so remarkably in their tendency that we can state the effects of prohibition with a good deal of1 confidence. “A. The arrests for drunkenness have fallen amazingly. The figures are particularly striking where they are given by months. In New Haven, e. g., there was a marked drop in June, 1919, when war prohibition went Jnto effect and another one in January, 1920,1 when the Volstead act went into ef fect, the arrests in th^ later month having been less than one-seventh what they had been a year before. “B. Deaths from alcoholism have shown a very marked decrease as in stanced by the vital statistics both of cities and of the Metropolitan Life In surance company. “O. Misdemeanors* lawlessness and neglect of children likewise underwent a profound fall with prohibition. “D. On the other hand, there Is every evidence of increased saving and thrift with the cutting down of the liquor bill. This has shown itself statist! Let this trial offer prove for you at our expense whether more Iron in your blood will make you well and strong Physician tells why you must have Iron to give you Health, Strength, Energy and Endurance. Lack of Iron in your blood produces the most terrible of all de vitalizing weaknesses and makes a man or woman a physical and mental weakling, nerv ous, irritable and easily tired out,” says Dr. Barnes FrancisSullivan, formerly Physician at Bellevue Hospital (Out door Dept.) and the Westchester County Hospital. "It is the iron in your blood that takes up oxygen from your lungs. The food you eat contains carbon. As di gested food is absorbed into the blood, the car bon in the food unites with the oxygenated iron in your blood, and Blood corpuscles rich in Starved blood Corpuscle« ironp highly magnified. highly magnified Dy so doing gives on tremendous power and energy, thereby giving you great force, phys ical and mental vigor, and producing the ma terial which becomesactrve,livingcells,flesh, muscle, bone and tissue, thus performingone of the most remarkable miracles of life. Without iron, even three big meals a day will not do you any good—you do not get any strength out of your food—it is like putting coal into a stove without a Are.” Blood examinations by physicians all over the country show that three people out of every four you meet lack 10096 iron in their blood, often due to modern methods of cook ing and modern diet. For centuries scientists tried in vain to produce iron like the iron in your blood and like the iron in spinach, len tils and apples. Atlasttheproblemwassolved. so that you can now obtain this newerformof iron from any druggist under the name of ‘‘Nuxated Iron,” which is ready for immedi ate Absorption by the blood the moment it enters the system. A single daily dose of this newer form of iron gives your blood the op portunity of assimilating in 'concentrated form, iron like the iron that yon could get by eating raisins, apples or spinach. It is often remarkable what a tremendous amountof pep, vigor, force and energy a little more iron will give a person whose blood is deficient in this magic-like substance. Nuxated Iroicoften in creases me srrengtn and endurance or weak, nervoug, run-down folks in two weeks’ time. Trial Coupon Fill in this coupon with your name and I * address and take it to any druggist in your I city. Deposit with him the price of one I regular full-size bottle of Nuxated Iron. . I This is nOt a payment, but a deposit only. | | /f is still your money. If you are not f more than delighted with the results ob- • | tained by two weeks' use of Nuxated Iron, | I simply return the outside wrapper to your * I own druggist whs* will promptly refund j your money. We will repay the druggist i | the full amount he refunds upon receipt of ' ■ the coupon and wrapper. J DAE HEALTH LABORATORIES ■ New York City | Name . J | Address | ilIIVATCn IDflH tNKicnta int DLuvu-oivtb RUaAI LI/ IKUI1 YOU NEWSTRjEN&THAND ENERGY R. R. Bellamy Son, H. X* Fentress,feardin’s Pharmacy, I* B. Sasser ■ . I Announcement Our New Men’s and Boys’ Shop Will Be Open Tuesday Morning at 214 North Front Street—Ready for Business Monday We Move Starting early Monday morning, with several extra men, we will move our Men’s and Boys’ Clothing and Furnishings from our main store to our new location, 214 North Front street, better known by many as our whole sale department. The main floor has been remodeled into an up-to-date re tail shop for men and boys. The wholesale department will be continued on the second and third floors. We believe our friends and customers will welcome this step forward to better service. We are planning to have within the next two or three weeks one of the most up-to-date lines of men’s and boys’ furnishings in the city. Not high-priced lines, but real merchandise that we will recommend to give entire satisfaction. Our salesmen will be pleased to have you visit them in our new shopr caily in the savings bank deposits and it is also reflected in the experience of charitable organizations, which found that the recent period of unem ployment did not bring as great de mand upon them as had been the case in other times of financial depression, and the only possible explanation was that the laboring class had saved their money. In concluding his address, which was delivered before the Rotary club of New Haven and is to be widely distrib uted as a pamphlet, Mr. Farnam asks two questions, one practical, the other ethical—What is the best way to les sen the evils of the liquor traffic? and What is our duty as citizens? The most serious charge brought against the eighteenth amendment by its critics is that it fails to urohibit. Therefore, its evils may be diminished by a better administration of the law. .Another question is whether man has a right to defy the law of the land. What dis regard of the law really means is well expressed by the chairman of the judi cial section erf the American Bar asso ciation: “When for the gratification of their appetites or the promotion of their in terests lawyers, bankers, great mer chants and manufacturers and social leaders, both men and women, disobey and scoff at the law, or any other law, they are aiding the cause of anarchy and promoting mob violence, rohberv and homicide; they are sowing drag ons* teeth, and they need nnt be sur prised when they find that no judi<*i;tS or police authority can save our coun try or humanity from reaping th * harvest.” Guard Your Health Affords Utmost Protection PREVENTIVE for MEN Large Tube S5c. Kit (4's) tl All Druggists or San-Y-Kit Dept. At 92 Beekman St., New York Write for Circular 41! CATARRH of BLADDER FRIENDLY CAFETERIA yesterday Every day, you hear them say— “We like to eat the FRIENDLY Way.” / \ •' You, too, will like the deli cious dishes served here FRIENDLY CAFETERIA » Opposite American Legion Hut
Wilmington Morning Star (Wilmington, N.C.)
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Feb. 4, 1923, edition 1
6
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