100 years ago today, prohibitionists brought their first constitutional amendment to ban the sale of alcohol before the House of Representatives. The vote went in their favour by 197 to 190 but fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to progress. It would be another three years before the amendment was passed by the House and Senate.
The debate of 22 December 1914 is best remembered for the speech delivered by Richmond Hobson, a moral entrepreneur
par excellence, known as
Alcohol: The Great Destroyer. It was a speech he had delivered many times in his tub-thumping career and the version he gave that day is reprinted below with a few notes by me in italics. Readers will see that there is nothing new about campaigners using junk science, sophistry, dodgy statistics and attacks on industry to push for bans.
'These convictions are permanent, because they are founded
on questions of fact and not of opinion. They revolve about
the nature of alcohol, a chemical compound whose properties
have been definitely ascertained at the hands of science. Whether
members of this House are "wet" or "dry," all should acquaint
themselves with the recent findings of science as to what alcohol
really is, and the effect it really has upon the human organisms,
and through the human organisms the political and social
organisms. In other words, Mr. Speaker, the whole question
hinges upon the truth about alcohol.
The Good Book tells us, "And ye shall know the truth, and
the truth shall make you free."
I assume, Mr. Speaker, that every member in this House will
be loyal to the truth when in his own reason and in his own
conscience he has found it. Loyalty to the truth is really the
true test of a man, whether he is in the image of his Maker
and is worthy of that dignity that attaches to human life above
the life of the brute living on the plane of self-preservation.
I realize full well, Mr. Speaker, how with the deceptive
properties of alcohol and the powerful financial interests connected with it the average man of today has been molded in an
atmosphere of error as to its real nature. The educational effects of his observation as to the harmful effects of drunkenness have been partly dissipated by the constant reiteration that
the harm comes from the abuse and not the temperate use,
the results of which do not appear on the surface. As a matter
of fact the effect of the moderate use of alcoholic beverages
spread over the whole nation has done and is doing vastly
more harm than all the drunkenness and intemperance combined.'
[Note that most of the science Hobson discusses here and throughout his speech was the quackery of 'scientific temperance' which has long since been debunked (indeed, it had been debunked at the time). Note also Hobson's eagerness to go beyond heavy drinking and drunkenness—which everybody knew were hazardous from observation and experience—to the more arguable harms of moderate consumption. It was an article of faith for prohibitionists that there was 'no safe level' of alcohol consumption and that even one drink was an addictive poison. Today, the 'no safe level' argument is commonly made about tobacco, secondhand smoke and even nicotine, and medical temperance campaigners such as Tim Stockwell and David Nutt are making concerted efforts to undermine the (very strong) epidemiological evidence that moderate drinking is healthy. Modern campaigners are particularly interested in pushing the (very small and possibly non-causal) link between light drinking and breast cancer to promote total abstinence. - CJS]
'The substance about which this whole question revolves is a
chemical compound of the group of the oxide derivatives of the
hydrocarbons, its formula being C2H5(OH), 2 atoms of carbon,
6 of hydrogen, and 1 of oxygen [this is the chemical structure of ethynol - CJS]. Among the other members
of this group may be mentioned carbolic acid, chloral hydrate —
popularly called chloral — morphine, and strychnine. Alcohol is
produced by the process of fermentation, in which process ferment germs devour glucose in solution derived from grain,
grapes, and other substances, and in their life processes they
throw off waste products like other living organisms. One of
the waste products is the gas that causes bubbling. The other
waste product is the liquid alcohol. Alcohol is then the toxin,
the loathsome excretion of a living organism. It comes under
the general law governing toxins, namely, the toxin of one form
of life is a poison to the form of life that produced it and a
poison to every other form of life of a higher order. The
ferment germs are single-cell germs — the lowest form of life
known — consequently their toxin, alcohol, is a poison to all forms
of life, whether plants, animals, or men — a poison to the elemental protoplasm out of which all forms of life are constructed.
The first scientific finding about alcohol is that "alcohol is a protoplasmic poison." An organic substance placed in alcohol is
preserved indefinitely, because no living thing — neither germs of
decomposition nor the ferment germs themselves — can penetrate
the alcohol.
We must therefore surrender all our preconceived ideas about
the supposed food value and benefits of alcohol, even in the
smallest quantities. As an illustration, one mug of mild beer —
supposed to be beneficial and helpful — will in thirty minutes
lower the efficiency of the average soldier 36 per cent in aiming
his rifle.
Alcohol has the property of chloroform and ether of penetrating actually into the nerve fibers themselves, putting the
tissues under an anesthetic which prevents pain at first, but when the anesthetic effect is over discomfort follows throughout
the tissues of the whole body, particularly the nervous system,
which causes a craving for relief by recourse to the very substance that produced the disturbance. This craving grows
directly with the amount and regularity of the drinking.
The poisoning attack of alcohol is specially severe in the
cortex cerebrum — the top part of the brain — where resides the
center of inhibition, or of will power, causing partial paralysis,
which liberates lower activities otherwise held in control, causing
a man to be more of a brute, but to imagine that he has been
stimulated, when he is really partially paralyzed. This center
of inhibition is the seat of the will power, which of necessity
declines a little in strength every time partial paralysis takes
place.
Thus a man is little less of a man after each drink he takes.
In this way continued drinking causes a progressive weakening
of the will and a progressive growing of the craving, so that
after a time, if persisted in, there must come a point where the
will power cannot control the craving and the victim is in the
grip of the habit. [Modern research does not support this theory of alcoholism - CJS]
These victims are driven imperatively to procure their liquor,
no matter at what cost [as Prohibition proved! - CJS]. A few thousand brewers and distillers
making up the organizations composing the great liquor trust,
have a monopoly of the supply [thousands of companies having a monopoly is obviously an oxymoron - CJS], and they therefore own these
5,000,000 slaves and through them they are able to collect
$2,500,000,000 cash from the American people every year.
In this way nearly two-thirds of all the money in circulation
in America in the course of a year passes into the hands of the
liquor trust.
Labor unions ought to realize that liquor is their deadliest
enemy. It lowers the standard of character and the standard
of living of labor. It dissipates the earnings of labor, interferes
with savings, and increases the dependence of labor upon the
will of capital. It breeds the violence and disorder that often
bring labor's cause into disrepute and give the victory to their
opponents. In an industrial struggle, as in any other struggle, if
both opponents are sober, there is good chance for arbitration.
If one side is debauched by liquor, it will lose. The road to
solve the problems between capital and labor is to make the
whole country dry as the mining regions of Colorado were made
dry in the strike. If the capital now invested in liquor were
put to useful channels it would employ more than a million and
a half additional men, wage-earners, and largely solve the problem of the unemployed. This tremendous increase in the
demand for labor would cause a general rise in wages and a
corresponding rise in the standard of living.
Railroads, armies, manufacturing plants, and other employers
of men are rapidly coming to realize the heavy toll of inefficiency
and loss of productiveness on the part of men in their employ
even from moderate drinking. Scientific management of modern
industry in every branch is rapidly coming to demand total
abstinence.
Investigations in connection with employers' liability for
accident and sickness are rapidly disclosing the responsibility of
liquor for the bulk of the accidents and the sickness in mines,
mills, and shops and other operations.
My figures indicate a general loss of efficiency of about 21.5
per cent for the American producer, on the average. This entails an economic loss of over $8,000,000,000 by the nation. As
I shall point out in a few moments, liquor causes the premature
death of about 700,000 American citizens every year. This entails
an economic loss of about five billions.
[The estimate of 700,000 is almost certainly a vast exaggeration, but it is interesting to see that spurious cost estimates (such as the recent report on obesity) have a long pedigree - CJS]
I call attention of members to the charts that show that
liquor is causing the bulk of the crime, pauperism, and insanity
and, leaving the support of these upon the public, causes a
burden in direct taxation upon the American people of nearly
two billions. Taking away from our people, as pointed out
above, two and one-half billions, the sum total of the economic
burden laid upon the shoulders of the nation approximates the
total sum of about $16,000,000,000. We call the federal government extravagant when it lays a burden of one billion for purposes of uplift and we stand by complacently as liquor places a
burden of sixteen billions for purposes of degeneracy and destruction, and there are some so deluded as to imagine that the
government should encourage liquor because of the paltry two
hundred and odd millions of revenue [note the false comparison between personal income forgone and government revenue - CJS]. Let no enlightened member talk about the need of liquor revenues. I say to him what
Mr. Gladstone said to the deputation of brewers who made the
same claim:
'Give me a sober people who do not waste their substance on strong drink
and I will find ready means of raising the necessary revenues for their
government.'
The liquor trust through its vast hordes of money corrupts
our elections, not only to control the results in wet and dry
campaigns, but the election of officers and political parties subservient to liquor interests. In many wet and dry campaigns
bankers have been put under duress and required to notify
farmers, merchants, and other business men that they would call
in their loans if the elections went dry. [This is rich. The Anti-Saloon League were masters of political intimidation - CJS]
The growing degenerate vote directly due to liquor is now
menacing not only the elections in our great cites, but in the
states that have large cities, and even in the nation itself. Liquor
not only creates this degenerate vote, but it also keeps a corruption fund available to purchase that vote, and does not hesitate
to spend vast sums for this purpose. In this way it stands with
club in hand over politicians and political parties.
It is not surprising, therefore, to find the menace of this great
blighting influence in our political life, by which our elections
cannot be normal and political forces cannot follow in their
normal course without cross currents and counter currents. It
is vain to hope for honest elections until the country is dry.
The liberties and institutions of a free people must depend
for their perpetuity upon the average standard of character of
the electorate. In America where we have manhood suffrage
the degeneracy produced, particularly in big cities, is undermining the foundations of our institutions.
It is this same lowering of the average standard of character
of the citizenship in the past that entailed the overthrow of the
liberties of Greece and Rome and other republics. It seems
rather ironical for liquor men to call upon the name of liberty. [Redefining liberty is a common tactic of prohibitionists for obvious reasons - CJS]
Through control of political parties and politicians and from the supply of needed revenues liquor gets a strangle hold upon
the government, and for ages governments have largely looked
to liquor to supply revenues and give support for continuance in
power.
It is a clear sign of the times to note the general change of
attitude of the governments of Europe toward liquor. All governments should now be in full possession of the findings of
science as to the real nature of alcohol, consequently when the
general war broke out in Europe the governments, though in
great need of revenues, promptly took advantage of the powers
conferred under martial law to strike liquor a deadly blow [though not quite a 'deadly blow', the belligerent countries did indeed curtail alcohol sales - CJS].
Shortly after the promulgation of martial law the Russian
government, in spite of the loss of hundreds of millions in
revenue, issued a proclamation to compel prohibition of the
national drink — vodka. This order has been made permanent
and, broadly speaking, the Russian empire is to remain dry
forever [prohibition in Russia was repealed in the 1920s - CJS].
The French government likewise issued a proclamation of
prohibition of the manufacture and sale of absinthe, and has
since extended this to include other distilled liquors
[the green fairy was legalised in France only recently - CJS].
After the proclamation of martial law the German government closed down the breweries throughout the empire and
has promulgated drastic measures for prohibition in the war
zone of the east. When a child is born in Germany the government sends a card to the mother warning against the deadly
nature of alcohol. When a child enters public school in Berlin
the Prussian government sends an anti-alcohol card to the father
and mother by the child.
It seems too bad that the Germans who have cast their lot
in America should not have caught the progressive spirit of
the fatherland. Eight hundred German scientists, 116 of them
professors in German universities, have made a unanimous
report on the nature of beverage alcohol, recommending its
complete elimination. A German staff physician of the German
army has announced that "we should not discuss moderation
with a man. The thing has long since been settled by science.
The use of narcotic poisons is simply indecent and criminal."
It should be a source of humiliation to well-informed Americans that our government shows no indications of change of
attitude toward liquor. Our need for revenue is much less
than that of the nations at war, and yet in sections 1 and 2 of
the revenue bill recently passed we turned to liquor for nearly
one-half the total amount, strengthening the hold of liquor upon
the finances of the government
[the government's dependence on alcohol taxes had actually been broken when the 16th Amendment was ratified in 1913 - CJS]. Liquor has the same stranglehold upon the throat of our government today that slavery
had before 1860. Congress has not permitted the cotton planter
to deposit his cotton in bond, but it has done everything for
the distiller so he can place his liquor in bond and on these
warrants get financial advances.
The first finding of science that alcohol is a protoplasmic
poison and the second finding that it is an insidious, habit-forming drug, though of great importance, are as unimportant
when compared with the third finding, that alcohol degenerates
the character of men and tears down their spiritual nature.
Like the other members of the group of oxide derivatives of
hydrocarbons, alcohol is not only a general poison, but it has a
chemical affinity or deadly appetite for certain particular tissues.
Strychnine tears down the spinal cord. Alcohol tears down the
top part of the brain in a man, attacks certain tissues in an
animal, certain cells in a flower. It has been established that
whatever the line of a creature's evolution alcohol will attack
that line. Every type and every species is evolving in building
from generation to generation along some particular line. Man
is evolving in the top part of the brain, the seat of the will
power, the seat of the moral senses, and of the spiritual nature,
the recognition of right and wrong, the consciousness of God
and of duty and of brotherly love and of self-sacrifice.
[Most of this is nonsense, though there is evidence that links alcoholism to frontal lobe dysfunction - CJS]
All life in the universe is founded upon the principle of evolution. Alcohol directly reverses that principle. Man has risen
from the savage up through successive steps to the level of the
semi-savage, the semi-civilized, and the highly civilized. [Here comes the racism - CJS]
Liquor promptly degenerates the red man, throws him back
into savagery. It will promptly put a tribe on the warpath.
Liquor will actually make a brute out of a negro, causing
him to commit unnatural crimes.
The effect is the same on the white man, though the white
man being further evolved it takes longer time to reduce him
to the same level. Starting young, however, it does not take
a very long time to speedily cause a man in the forefront of
civilization to pass through the successive stages and become
semi-civilized, semi-savage, savage, and, at last, below the brute.
The spiritual nature of man gives dignity to his life above the life of the brute. It is this spiritual nature of man that
makes him in the image of his Maker, so that the Bible referred
to man as being a little lower than the angels. It is a tragedy
to blight the physical life. No measure can be made of
blighting the spiritual life. [A strange combination of evolutionary science and scripture - CJS]
Nature does not tolerate reversing its evolutionary principle,
and proceeds automatically to exterminate any creature, any
animal, any race, any species that degenerates. Nature adopts
two methods of extermination— one to shorten the life, the other
to blight the offspring.
Alcohol, even in small quantities, attacks all the vital organs
and the nervous system, the tissues, and the blood. A large
percentage of premature deaths arising from disease are due to
this cause. The attack on the blood lowers the efficiency of the
white blood corpuscles to destroy the disease germs, exposing
the drinker far more than the abstainer to the ravages of consumption, pneumonia, typhoid, and other germ diseases. The
records of insurance companies show that in the periods from
twenty-five to forty-five the mortality of total abstainers is only
a fraction of that of the average. This means that the bulk of
deaths in young manhood are due to alcohol. It means that
people ought not to die in their prime any more than animals [animals frequently die in their prime, even in the absence of farming - CJS].
The records of the insurance companies show that a man
starting at the age of 20 as a total abstainer lives to the average
age of 65, whereas starting at the age of 20 as a moderate
drinker he dies at 51, losing over fourteen years, or a cutting
down of nearly one-third of his days
[this claim was probably untrue in 1914 and would certainly be untrue today - CJS].
Starting at the age of twenty as a heavy drinker a man dies
at thirty-five, a sheer loss of two-thirds of the span of his whole
life.
We are dying at the rate of 1,000 deaths per 61,000 of the
population. Total abstainers in our midst are dying at the rate
of 560 per 61,000 of the population, though living under the
same conditions. The latter figures are those applied to adult
males as shown by the insurance companies' figures. Investigations show that the shortening of life of the offspring is far
greater and more serious than that of the parent, as I will point
out later, and since the adult males are the fathers of the young
of both sexes it is on the side of conservatism to apply the
proportion to the whole population, so that we can conservatively
say that 440 additional deaths are caused every year per 61,000 of the population — deaths that are premature and unnecessary.
This means that alcohol actually kills fully 700,000 American
citizens every year.
When these figures were first printed they were subject to
some ridicule and to many attempts to disprove them. Several
German scientists have employed the same methods of reasoning,
and the liquor interests of the continent have a standing offer
of 6,000 marks to any scientist that can disprove the figures of
the great insurance companies which are the foundation of this
awful conclusion.
When the great Titanic sank in mid-ocean with her precious
cargo and shocked the whole world, she carried down less than
1,600 souls. Alcohol carries down to a premature grave every
day more than 2,000 American souls. [Comparing self-inflicted deaths with deaths from disasters was a popular tactic in 1914 and remains popular in 'public health' today; see below - CJS]
Mr. Gladstone in the maturity of his philosophy announced
that "strong drink is more destructive than the historic scourges
of war, pestilence, and famine combined." The old philosopher
was eminently correct. Many battles have been fought in history
for which there is no authentic report of the casualty, but of
those of which there are records, from the Macedonian war,
300 B.C., down to and including the Russo-Japanese war, the
sum total foots up to 2,800,000 killed and wounded, which, being
apportioned, would make a little more than 2,100,000 wounded
and a little less than 700,000 killed. Bearing in mind the qualifying circumstances, it can be generally said, therefore, that
alcohol brings to a premature grave more Americans in one
year than all the wars of the world, as recorded, have killed
on the field of battle in 2,300 years [
utter drivel - CJS].
When the great war in Europe is over it will be found that
the sum total killed on the field of battle for all nations will
average less than 1,500 a day [actually, it turned out to be over 10,000 a day - CJS]. Alcohol averages 2,000 Americans
a day. Europe is really in the eyes of nature better off today
in the midst of her great tragedy than she has been for centuries,
because Europe is almost dry [not really - CJS]. The convention of life insurance
presidents recently announced that Russia is saving fully 50,000
lives of her adult males per year from her recent prohibition
order, which in a brief period of time will far more than make
up for the soldiers killed in battle. No great nation was ever
overthrown in war until after its vitality had been undermined
by degeneracy arising from alcoholic dissipation.
When a soldier falls on the field of battle we all realize the tragedy, but in reality it is only his physical life that has been
snuffed out. The bullet that pierced the brave soldier's heart
never touched his character. When his soul rose to appear
before its Maker it had no wound. But when the victim is
stretched out in premature death from alcohol not only are his
heart and other organs and tissues of his body wounded but
the ghastly wound is the rent torn in his soul.
Civilized nations forbid in warfare the use of flat-nosed
bullets that spatter in the flesh and bone. Alcohol uses dum-dums that not only spatter in the flesh and bone but crash into
the soul.
I realize full well how cruel war is, having had friends of
mine among Spanish officers, men who had been kind to me in
prison, who had treated me like a brother, mortally wounded,
dying in agony
[Hobson built his prohibitionist career on his reputation as a war hero. See The Art of Suppression for details - CJS]. On board the Spanish wrecks shortly after the
battle of Santiago I saw the dead men about the decks where
they had fallen at their posts of duty. I realized they were
brave men and good men, and my soul cried out at the cruelty
of their being killed at our hands. I realized not only the
cruelty but also the calamity of war, particularly when it overtakes a nation unprepared as our nation is; but if I had to
choose one or the other of these two destructive agents, alcohol
or war, I would rather see America, sober, stand alone and face
the combined world; I would rather see my country, as defenseless as I know she is, face all the great armies of the world
rather than to see this great internal destroyer continue
unchecked his deadly ravages throughout our land.
Alcohol makes a deadly attack upon the organ of reproduction in both male and female, and upon the nervous system of
the little life before birth in the embryonic period. One-half of 1
per cent of alcohol in solution, such as a future mother might
easily have in her circulation in attending a banquet or fashionable dinner, drinking only wine or beer, will, oft repeated, kill
the little life and endanger the life and health of the mother.
If both parents are moderate drinkers, drinking but one glass
of wine or beer per day at one meal, the effect will more than
quadruple the chances of miscarriage of the mother, increasing
over 400 per cent the dangers and sufferings in maternity, and
will nearly double the percentage of their children that will die
the first year in infancy. The children of drinking parents on
the whole die off four to fivefold more rapidly than the children
of abstaining parents.
This means that scores and scores of thousands of little
children die every year from cruel wounds inflicted upon their
little lives before they were born at the hands of their parents
who did not know.
If both parents are alcoholic one child in five of those that
do survive will become insane before it is grown. One child in
seven will be born deformed. One child in three will become
epileptic, hysterical, or feeble-minded. Only one child in six
will be normal; five out of six will be blighted.
On the other hand, if both parents are total abstainers, there
will be no more dangers and suffering in maternity than in the
case of other species ; and no matter how hard the lot in life of
the parents may be, nine out of ten of their children will be
absolutely normal. These children normally born will be easy
to bring up, and, kept safe from degeneracy in their youth, will
tend to rise one degree higher and nobler in character than their
parents, following the line of the species evolution. If a family
or a nation is sober, nature in its normal course will cause
them to rise to a higher civilization. If a family or nation,
on the other hand, is debauched by liquor, it must decline and
ultimately perish.
Rome during long centuries was frugal and abstemious,
practicing absolute Prohibition within its walls, and during this
period we see the wonderful rise of the Roman Empire [not true - CJS]. When
the Romans gathered into their great city and the youth gave
themselves over to dissipation, we see the decline and finally
the fall of that great empire. Similarly the other nations and
empires of the past have risen only to fall.
We are all familiar with thoroughbred races of horses,
dogs, and so forth, but who ever heard of a thoroughbred race
of men? We know that great aggregates of plants and animals
continue to rise, but a great nation is only born to die. Heretofore a nation has only been able to rise to a certain level,
when, gathering in great cities, liquor has overtaken the youth
and a great millstone has settled about its neck. Back it sank,
never to rise again. We stand in the presence of this most
startling discovery of science — that alcohol has absolutely
disrupted the orderly evolution of the great human species.
Science has thus demonstrated that alcohol is a protoplasmic
poison, poisoning all living things; that alcohol is a habit-forming drug that shackles millions of our citizens and maintains slavery in our midst; that it lowers in a fearful way the standard of efficiency of the nation, reducing enormously the
national wealth, entailing startling burdens of taxation, encumbering the public with the care of crime, pauperism, and
insanity; that it corrupts politics and public servants, corrupts
the government, corrupts the public morals, lowers terrifically
the average standard of character of the citizenship, and undermines the liberties and institutions of the nation; that it undermines and blights the home and the family, checks education,
attacks the young when they are entitled to protection, undermines the public health, slaughtering, killing, and wounding our
citizens many fold times more than war, pestilence, and famine
combined; that it blights the progeny of the nation, flooding the
land with a horde of degenerates; that it strikes deadly blows
at the life of the nation itself and at the very life of the race, reversing the great evolutionary principles of nature and the
purposes of the Almighty.
There can be but one verdict, and that is this great destroyer
must be destroyed. The time is ripe for fulfillment. The present
generation, the generation to which we belong, must cut this
millstone of degeneracy from the neck of humanity.
What is the remedy for this great organic disease that is
nation-wide and world-wide in its blight? Evidently the treatment must itself be organic and must itself be nation-wide
and world-wide.
We can look to nature and find out in what organic treatment
consists, for instance, in diseases of the body physical. In the
case of a cure for such a disease the cure consists not in the
curing of the old disease tissues, but in the growth of young
tissue, and the very essence of the cure is to insure that the
disease or contagion shall not extend to the young tissue, giving
nature an opportunity to grow the cure.
The cure of the old drinkers is not nature's cure for such
an organic disease. It is not possible by enactment of a law to
make old drinkers stop drinking, to change the deep-seated
habits of a lifetime. The amendment proposed in this resolution does not undertake to coerce old drinkers; Or to regulate
the use of liquor by the individual [this is a lie. Prohibition sought to coerce everyone, young and old - CJS].
The cure for this disease lies in the stopping of the debauching of the young. Our generation must establish such conditions
that hereafter the young will grow up sober. This proposed
amendment is scientifically drawn to attain this end.
Upon this all must agree. A man may drink himself, but if
he is a good man he would love to see such conditions established that the young hereafter would grow up sober.
[One of the current euphemisms for tobacco prohibition is 'tobacco free generation' - CJS]
I call the attention of members to the chart showing that
68 per cent of all the drunkards had their habits contracted
before they were 21, 30 per cent before they were 16, and 7
per cent before they were 12. Less than 2 per cent of men begin
to drink after they are grown and settled down. [Note that these percentages don't add up to 100. Of course, most people do most things for the first time before they are 21 - CJS]. Some vast
agent in our midst is systematically teaching the boys to drink
and debauching the youth. Who is it that carries on this sinful
business? Certainly it is not the drinkers. A man may drink,
but unless he is a hopeless degenerate he would not teach boys
to drink. I have known many drinkers, but I have never yet
known one who made a habit of teaching boys to drink. This
sinister agent is the liquor trust of America.
Tens of thousands of paid agents all over the land are carrying out this devilish work. The most deadly work thus far
has been in the cities where it is hard for parents to keep track
of their boys, but it extends to towns and is now being systematically extended to country settlements. The usual method in
cities is to operate where boys come together, sometimes having
the boys' rendezvous in saloons but more frequently in pool
rooms and other places of amusement, sometimes on vacant lots.
The boot-legger or licensed agent of the liquor trust arranges to
have the boys drink before breaking up to be sociable or as a
sign of manliness. To better influence the young boy who is
just beginning a special drink is prepared called "Cincinnati,"
which is sweetened to appeal to the boy's taste. In some cases
where it is difficult to reach the boys through agents, as for
instance in the state of Oklahoma, the liquor trust has written
to them giving them numbers so that without the knowledge of
their parents, by mail or express, they can ship them liquor free. [Here we see the familiar claim that people only start to drink because Big Industry has manipulated them. Today, advertising is more often deemed to be the mechanism of manipulation. The logic of prohibition was that if you remove the industry, you remove the desire to drink. Prohibition exposed the inanity of this logic - CJS]
In order to effectively and scientifically solve this question
we must discover and must remove the motive. What is the
motive of the liquor trust in this vast debauching of the youth?
Some have assumed that the motive is to harm the boys, blighting the homes, and degenerating society in general. On this
assumption many have set about heaping abuse upon the agents
of the great liquor trust. For my part I realize this is not the
motive, that most of these agents are in the business to make
a living, and that the business has come down in natural courses from the past, an occupation for which the whole of society
stands responsible. Recognizing this, I have abused none; I
have no bitterness ; I have no desire to harm any man's business.
Mr. John McCullough, president of the Green River Distilling
Co., of Owensboro, Ky., one of the big liquor men of the country, has written to the big men in the business, suggesting that
the wise thing to do would be to stop fighting and ask for
terms on the basis of being allowed ten years in which to
adjust their business and for the government to set aside 10
per cent of the revenue collected from the business every year,
and at the end of the ten years for this fund to be used to
compensate those engaged in the business when the business is
closed. I have no authority to speak for others, but I do not
hesitate to say that if such a course were pursued by the liquor
trust it would certainly have my sympathetic consideration for
statutory adjustment. The South could have received hundreds
of millions of dollars for its slaves without war, but when it
chose war it could not come back after war and hope to receive
a dollar in compensation. The conditions are analogous for
the liquor traffic, though liquor has no real legal vested rights,
as held by slavery. If liquor continues its barbaric warfare to
the bitter end, it need not come asking for compensation.
The real motive in teaching the boys to drink is to develop
future customers. With a reasonably small outlay the liquor
trust can develop this appetite in the young and when the
young grow up with an appetite then as men they buy the
liquor, over the supply of which the liquor trust has a monopoly.
The large profits in the sale of their goods to customers thus
developed is the real motive of the great liquor trust in systematically debauching the youth of the nation.
The real scientific way to cure this evil therefore is to remove
the motive — the profits in the sale of the goods. Clearly, this
cannot be done by undertaking to coerce those who drink, but
it can be done by prohibiting the sale and everything that relates
to the sale, particularly to the manufacture for sale. This can
be done the more readily as barter and sale for profit have been
subject to public control since the earliest days.
When the motive is removed and the liquor interests can no
longer derive profits from the sale, then the great liquor trust
of necessity will disintegrate. The debauching of the young
will thus end and the young generation will grow up sober.
In this way no effort is made to coerce any citizen. Some old drinkers desiring to stop will take advantage of the changed
environment and stop ['making healthy choices easier' as modern public health zealots would say - CJS], and other old drinkers desiring to do so
will continue drinking until they die, subject to local or state
regulation or control; but when they die no new drinkers will
take their place and the next generation will be sober. This
method thus takes no chance of invading the sanctity of the
home or the liberties of the individual. Some men may feel that
they have an inherent right to drink liquor, but no man will
feel that he has a right to sell liquor. The proposed amendment
does not touch the question of the use of liquor, and partakes
in no manner of the nature of a sumptuary measure.
Twelve decisions of the United States Supreme Court have
declared that no citizen has an inherent right to sell liquor
[this is an argument that is often used, as if the lack of a written right was absence of a right in a common law system - CJS].
What this amendment does is to declare that the liquor trust
shall not for petty lucre continue to debauch the young; that
neither federal government, nor state, nor any citizens shall
fatten upon the weaknesses and miseries of the people.
In carrying out the prohibition of the sale, manufacture for
sale, and all that relates to sale, the next question that arises
is whether the scope of the prohibition should be limited to
small units, like the town and the county, or should extend to
the large units making it state-wide and nation-wide. It is
good to have a town dry rather than wet. It is better to have
a county dry rather than wet; but if prohibition is by the small
unit, then wet towns and wet counties will be found near by,
and the virus there generated will pass over continuously and
reinfect the dry town and the dry county. It is a good thing
to cut out one root of a cancer, it is a better thing to cut out
another root, but as long as a single root remains it will generate the virus and inject it into the circulation and reinfect the
whole system. As long as there is one state in the Union that
is wet it will be the base of operations and source of supply
for the national liquor trust, from which, through interstate
commerce, to infect all the other states. Poison generated in
any part of the body, projected into the circulation, will reach
all parts of the body, and no part can protect itself. The states
cannot protect themselves against interstate commerce, nor can
Congress delegate to the states this power. The liquor traffic is
the most inter-state of all business. Their organization is a
national organization. It is dealt with by the national government. [In other words, states that have voted to stay wet must have their democratic decision overturned because a neighbouring state has voted dry - CJS]
Under our present system limiting Prohibition to small units the great liquor trust has trampled upon the rights of states,
of counties, and of towns, and has taken pride in proclaiming
that "prohibition does not prohibit."
This pose of the liquor outlaw that he is above the operations
of local law is a complete and conclusive demonstration of the
need of a national law. There can be no cure of a cancer until
all the roots have been cut out, until no centers of contagion
are left to reinfect. Local option in various forms, and even
state-wide Prohibition, though valuable and useful, have not
proved adequate. Our whole experience shows that Prohibition
must be national. [After Prohibition came into force, the Anti-Saloon League set up an organisation to campaign for worldwide prohibition for the same reason, ie. to prevent 'contagion' from other countries - CJS]
If Congress, in the exercise of the taxing power, should
undertake to establish Prohibition by statute, the great liquor
trust would not permanently disintegrate, because what any one
Congress can do another Congress can undo. Wet and dry
elections would be continually following each other all the time,
and the country would be wet part of the time and dry part of
the time, and the youth would not have time to grow up sober —
the remedy would only be superficial. [Clearly, the prohibitionists feared that people would use democracy to undo prohibition - CJS]
To cure this organic disease we must have recourse to the
organic law. The people themselves must act upon this question.
A generation must be prevailed upon to place Prohibition in
their own constitutional law, and such a generation could be
counted upon to keep it in the constitution during its lifetime.
The liquor trust of necessity would disintegrate. The youth
would grow up sober. The final, scientific conclusion is that
we must have constitutional Prohibition, prohibiting only the
sale, the manufacture for sale, and everything that pertains to
the sale, and invoke the power of both federal and state governments for enforcement. The resolution is drawn to fill
these requirements.'
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