Democratic Sentinel, Volume 6, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 May 1882 — Political Parties and Whisky Drinkers. [ARTICLE]

Political Parties and Whisky Drinkers.

As so many Zealous Republicans, iu their extreme partisanship, have more than once expressed themselves substantially to tho effect that “morality and sobriety are only to be found in the Republimn party,’ the St Louis,Repub'icau concluded to start an investigation and ascertain, if possible, tho justioe or injustice of such a claim, by Jooking up the reporujof the commissioner oi in ernal revenue. ixing upon the nurnbei of saloons in the several States as indicative of the drinking propensi ties of the population, the Republican reports to the statistical tables published by the comii.Lsioner for the number of wholesale and retail dealers in liquor in the United States, their location, the number of distilleries and the total production in gallons for the year ended July 1, 1881. These tables show that tho total uumber ot drinking saloons is 170,640 in * population of 59*155,733, and that, “taking the country over, there is onesaloou to every 194 'leople.” The Republican next separates the States that voted for Gar-fi-ld from those that voted for Hancock, and as the statistical tables indicate the number ot saloons io each Stale, it finds thal in Garfield or Republican States, there is for every 260 people, whije ip the Hancock, or Democratic Sia'es, there isouo saloon for every 480 people. Arguing from these facts that morality and sobriety go together, the Republican reaches the conclusion that, as the preponderance of ifquor drinking is iu those States where the Republicans have a majority, the tnor.ls of the pohulat on must be correspondingly deteriorated. Speaking in the light of the statistics which it gives, the Republican finds “that there ifc much less liquor drank in Democratic States unfi communities In prop irtioq to population than in Republican States aud communities. “The current held.” it adds. Mhas been wholly at variance from this, it is to be remarked, tpo, that the Southern States show a much smaller ratio of saloon* than the Northern and Western States, And this would be true even if tho negroes were left entirely out or the questi >n and all the saloons credited to the whiter aloue It is remarkable, too, that Missouri has fewer saloons in proportion to population than Massachusetts, or to come nearer home, than Illinois.”