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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 1, 1917)
r-vTP(-wwjr -?- The Commoner FEBRUARY, 1917 9 Bishop of Tucson on Prohibition in Arizona Below will be found a statement recently published in the Fortnightly Review, giving the views of the Rt. Rev. Henry Granjon, Bishop of Tucson, Arizona. Special attention La called to this article, because the bishop, as will bo seen, opposed the law as originally passed. The fea ture which ho opposed has been modified and he recognized the good prohibition has done and is likely to do. Ed. , Prohibition, as enacted into law in this state, has proved rather beneficial, all things duly considered. It has done away with the saloon evil, and that alpne weighs 75 per cent in the. balance. With us the saloon -was, beyond the shadow of a doubt, an unmitigated evil. It was the bane of this young, struggling common wealth. Every man and woman who voted dry had chiefly in view the extermination of the sa loon. It has been closed tight, and all hope and pray that it will stay"closed. Our people take tho view that local option is only a half-measure, of little, value, and somewhat inconsistent. If good, the lesser of two evils, they reason that it should apply throughout the state; and if it is an undesirable move, they contend that this also applies to every community. They look upon local option as a mere makeshift, dodging tho real issue, and according more weight to the preference of local aggregations for the lower interests of life, than to tho high, moral worth of the movement, for the benefit of the people at large. In Arizona, Prohibition has prohibited, not absolutely, to be sure, but to a very apprecia-m-extent. From the laboring class it has taken away the ever-present temptation, and many a laborer, burdened with "a largo family, is glad that he has been made to learn, of necessity if not of his own choice, the boon of sobriety. Hence an increase of comforts in the home, of self-respect, of genuine family happiness and peace, and on the whole of law-abiding citizenry. In view of these good effects of prohibition, the majority of the people are perfectly satisfied with it. The price paid for the abolition of tho saloon, in the form of an increased taxation, is pro-rated among all classes, and is willingly ac cepted. Where an untoward aftermath of the measure was felt, is in certain side issues, such as gen eral business depression, which followed hard upon the heels of prohibition, although this may have been more of a coincidence than any thing else, and if remains to be seen whether, after prohibition has become a fixture and a habit, a strong reaction will not set in, to the ultimate benefit and satisfaction of all concerned. Again, prohibition lias begotten the bootlegger, and probably bootlegging, like smuggling, is one of those things that will ever be among us. But the worst features of bootlegging, sternly run down as it is by the officers of the law and necessarily limited, do not begin to compare with the far-reaching injury caused by the open door, licensed saloon. It has also be.en stated that prohibition has increased the number of drug fiends. However this may be, the evil has not reached the extent where it could materially affect the issue. The worst feature of the Arizona prohibiten law, and the one which caused me at the time to instruct my 'priests to discourage voting for It. was its disregard of the sacW rights of the church to use fermented wine fortfiiecUrebration of the Mass, and consequently to import it into the state. I took, care to warn the promoters of prohibition of the standing of the church in the matter, and of our determination to fight nil and every form of prohibition that failed to pro file an exemption on this score. Attention was also called by the medical and other liberal pro fessions' to the advisability of allowing an ex emption in favor of alcohol for medicinal and sc entific purposes. The prohibitionists were nn , i n framlne a drastic law that would leave no loophole of any sort or shape for infringe . "t'an(1 they simply waived aside our repre ss 8 by alleKing that the priests could nil: 8raPe-Juice and the scientists would find itntSime 8ubstftute for medicinal alcohol, This nr win ? Was fortunately encouraged by im IneTnS ?nd -advised utterances from lectur- b priests (one of them "did" Arizona recent- 7t'uu, G? bout th0 cowntry advocating pro hibition of tho most uncompromising type, and going so far as to say that it is up to tho church to substitute grapo-Juico for fermented wino for the Mass. This from tho mouth of Catholic clergymen; our separated friends have at least the excuso of lack of information in those mat ters. And I belicvo I can say, so far as Arizona is concerned, tho thought of slighting or mak ing little of tho Catholic religion never entered their minds. As a matter of fact, while some of my parish priests needing altar wino found themselves disbarred from using tho common carriers, as these were prohibited by law to ac cept interstate shipments of alcoholic products, they secured wine for Mass in whatever manner they could without tho least molestation. In so doing, however, there remained tho grievous and most distasteful fact that these priests woro placed in tho necessity of proceeding, technical ly, in violation of the letter of the law. These anomalies have now been corrected, by a recent decision of the state supreme court, and the common carriers accept shipments of liquor for "personal use." A new prohibition amend ment is about to be introduced, through tho in itiative process, which would abolish the per sonal privilege, but will grant an exemption for sacramental and scientific purposes. In conclusion I would say, speaking for this section of the country as specified at the start, I can not but stand in favor of prohibition in so far as, and precisely because it appears to bo tho only available means at present to stamp tho un speakable saloon out of existence. Together with a majority of my people I believe that on the whole this is decidedly a blessing. That the same result could eventually bo attained, and temperance efficiently promoted by methods less drastic and more in accord with human nature than prohibition in its extreme form, seems not Improbable. The principle of personal use un der proper regulations, being an inherent right of every human being, might bo respected. Tho law might content itself with prohibiting highly spirituous liquors, or taxing them so as to make them prohibitive, and permitting only very light wines and very light beers. Punishment for drunkenness could be made so severe as to prove remedial and a deterrent. Whatever ways and means might be devised, so long as they avoided extremes and struck tho just medium, woujd probably in the long run bring the people nearer to the reform sought than a system of coercion. However, as things stand there is no choice, and prohibition, with all its faults and flaws, seems to me a worthy cause. The experiment is worth while even if only partially successful. As to the many, very many, thank God, who know how to use nature's gifts as God intended them to be used, .and who honor their manhood by their self-control and habits of moderation, the sac rifice asked of them is one of Christian renounce ment and brotherly love, well worth generous acceptance for the, sake of the vast throng of weaker fellowmen who, as it seems, can be saved from themselves only by the use of the strong arm of the law. After everything has been said pro and con, so long as our constitutional re ligious rights are not trespassed upon, we as Catholics, children of saints, may well afford to join the crusade of our times, and let our. ex ample shine before the world, .that God and His church may be glorified. r AMENDMENT FOR NATIONAL PROHIBITION IrcHhe house of representatives, December 22, 1916, Representative Martin A. Morrison of In diana introduced the following joint resolution proposing an amendment to the constitution of the United States: "Resolved by the senate and house of repre sentatives of the United States of America in m congress assembled (two-thirls of each house concurring therein), That the following amend ment to the constitution be, and hereby is, pro posed to the states, to become valid as a part of the constitution when ratified by the legislatures of the severa,l states as provided by the constitu tion: , L "Section 1. That the manufacture, trans portation, importation, sale, barker, exchange, gift, or other disposition of intoxicating liquors ' for beverage purposes In the United States and all torritory subject to the Jurisdiction thoroof, and tho exportation thereof, aro forever prohih ltcd. "Sec. 2. That the soveral states within their rospectivo Jurisdictions shall havo power to enact all needful legislation for tho enforcement of so much of section ono horeof as rolates to tho manufacture, iutrastato transportation, sale, barter, exchange, gift, or othor disposition of in toxicating liquors; and it shall bo tho duty of tho congress to enact all noodful legislation for .tho enforcement of all othor provisions of said section one. "Sec. 3. That this artlclo shall not be deemed or construed to affect any power no vested in tho several statos In rolation to Intox icating liquors for other thun boverago pur. poses." PIIOIIIIUTION A SUCCESS A' traveling man of wido experienco writos as follows, of the prohibition law of tho west and tho effect-of tho law: "Before I loft San Francisco I dotormlned to investigate very thoroughly, conditions which exist now In tho cities of Portlnnd, Ore., also Seattle, Tucoma and Spokane, Warni-nuton, compared to conditions which existed beforo tho states of Oregon and Washington went dry; as affecting the individual and tho business peoplo. Pleaso permit mo to state that I Interviewed the principal business people In oach of tho cities referred to, and-1 do not heiitnto to state, that without a singlo exception, every ono of them stated to mo that they did not believe that they could overestimate tho groat benefit which these states referred to had dcrlvod from havlnr gone dry. "They statod that the families of all of tho working peoplo aro very much better provided for, and that all of the small merchants, whoso stores arc situated in the parts of the different cities where the working people reside, stato. without oxooptlon, that neroru tno states re ferred to went dry, that the working peoplo vlr-. tually all owed them bills, which would lap from time to time, and were never paid up In tull, and that now thoy pay their, bills promptly, and havo paid up all of their old bills, and that thoy are doing a larger and raoro profitable business than ever before. "The large, representative merchants In theso different cities referred to, state that tho de posits in all of the savings banks have Increased very materially. They state also that tho busi ness of all of the large department stores shows a decided Increase, which thoy attribute to tho fact that the families of the working men havo more money to spend. "Theso representative morchants also statp that the same condition of tilings applies virtu ally to every small city and town throughout tho states referred to. "The writer trusts that you may live to see prohibition put into law in every stato In the Union, which you are so earnestly working to accomplish, and that you may have the satis faction of realizing this within the next- few years, the same as you have lived to see put in--to law during the last four years, the many things which you have fought for so hard, be ginning with 89G." Tho states of Iowa, South Dakota and Ne braska all went dry duringVlliG Ia3t year. When the issue of whether salodna should bo permit ted In the District of Columbia was before the ' senate recently boUh of the Iowa senators and both of the South Dakota senators, believing that they were sent to Washington to repre sent the sentiment of their people on moral questions also, voted for prohibition. Senator Norris of Nebraska, whose, state went 30,000 dry In November, also voted for prohibition in the district. Senator Hitchcock, of Nebraska, alone of the six senators voted against it. Having clone their best to have the Webb--fCenyon law declared unconstitutional, the rep- resentatives of the liquor interests are now saying Uiat the decision AGAINST tho SALOON makes national prohibition unnecessary. Would they have admitted that a decision against the law would have made national prohibition necessary? No, they simply try to play ths state against the nation and the nation against thd state. .H