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THE REASON IF
A militant WEEKLY.
THE REASON COMPANY
81 Express Building.
No. 11.
“PROOF OF PUDDING IN THE
EATING.”
Os all the “reform movements" which have re
ceived any considerable support from churches and
Christian people in recent years, prohibition has
resulted in the most ignomious failure and has been
attended by the most lamentable consequences.
Through an agitation which has always had a moral
end. the most dreadful immoralities have been devel
oped and made conspicuous. Thousands of people
whose attention had been called to the great evil
of intemperance hastily concluded that the only
remedy lay in the prohibition of the manufacture
and sale of alcoholic beverages, and, with the best
intentions imaginable, have done their utmost to
bring about the passage of sumptuary laws, never
stopping to consider whether such laws were possi
ble of enforcement, or whether they might result in
bringing about a condition of affairs far more dread
ful than any which existed before. I nfortunately.
many of God's people, who lead exemplary Chris
tian lives, are sadly lacking in wisdom and good
judgment and we know of no class of people w ho are
so utterly unfit to grapple with great public qiies
tions as ministers of the gospel. We can state, from
our own personal observation, that in scores of in
stances wdiere clergymen have been most, active in
their efforts to eradicate vice and promote tem
perance, they have succeeded only in scattering the
social evil and increasing drunkenness.
So far as our own personal experience goes, and
it has been considerable, we have never yet visited a
community where prohibitory law’s existed and
found it very difficult to obtain intoxicants. In
many instances w’e arc firmly convinced that prohibi-
ONE YEAR SI.OO.
rITE LEMS.
SAVANNAH, (JA.. JULY’ 4, 1008
tion has resulted in increasing the amount of drunk
enness and in materially augmenting the number of
tipplers. There are thousands of homes in prohibi
tion communities where a bottle of whiskey was
never kept so long as it could be obtained without
difficulty at drug stores or saloons, but now it is
kept always on hand “for medicinal purposes in cast*
of emergency." Only too (d'ten the sons in such
families have learned to drink at home, when they
might never have gone into a saloon.
During the last two months we have traveled ex
tensively in Georgia and have been at pains to make
careful inquiry with regard to the workings of the
prohibition law in the State. In rural communities,
which were dry before the passage of tin* State law
and wdiere the sentiment of the people demands it.
comparatively little difficulty is experienced in en
forcing prohibition; but in all the larger cities and
towms. the law is being flagrantly violated, and we
art 1 convinced that there is more whiskey sold at re
tail than ever before in tin 1 history of the State. In
addition to this, liquor is being ordered from Chat
tanooga, Jacksonville, Montgomery and other cities
outside the State, and is delivered by express, to
the consumer direct, in quantities that are well nigh
appalling. Atlanta papers have stated that $250,000
per month is sent out of that city alone for whiskey,
and in many other sections of tin 1 State the amount
so expended is almost, if not quite, as large propor
tionately. Think of it! Almost $25 per year per
capita spent for whiskey by a prohibition city, in
addition to the amount spent by the poor man wdio
buys the vilest kind of poison at disreputable ‘“blind-
EDITED BY
LAMAR PARKER.
Vol. 1.
