Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1903 — KNOTTS IN A NEW ROLE. [ARTICLE]

KNOTTS IN A NEW ROLE.

Hammond’s Mayor Issues a Strong Temperance Sermon In Vetoing a Liquor Ordinance. People of this county are familiar with the campaign made by A. F. Knotts for the legislature four years ago, when be made a special plea for the whiskey vote. In a letter written to the saloonkeepers he said of Mr. D. H. Yeoman, his opponent: “He is a very good man but you know he is not our kind.” Evidently Knotts has changed his ideas and, like another politician we have in mind, is now betraying the men who then placed him in office. In vetoing an ordinance reducing the liquor license fee in Hammond a few days ago. Mayor Knotts issued the following strong temperance article, in justifies tin of his position: It is conceded by everybody, even the saloon keeper himself, that intemperance, drunkennes and the liquor traffic are evils, and that they should be discouraged and restricted, and that higher license will decrease the number of saloons, fewer saloons will mean fewer temptations, and fewer opportunities to drink, and less drinking will discourage the traffic. Eyery person must either support himself, by some useful and productive toil, or else be supported by those who are so employed. The brewers, distillers, saloon keepers and others employed in the liquor traffic supported directly or indirectly by them, are engaged in a business that is not only non-productive and useless, but is absolutely and positively detrimental and harmful, and are supported and maintained by those who produce, viz., the toiler. There are ninety saloons in the city of Hammond. Each saloon, on an average, is supporting two men with families and one worthless hanger-on without a family. There are many beer depots, with wagons, teams and men, many of whom have families, making in all at least 250 men, and enough women and children to aggregate 1,000 persons, who are directly supported by the traffic, to say nothing of rent, fuel, light, insurance, etc., and the dividends paid to the brewery and whisky trusts. And all this must be borne, without any compensation whatever, by the workingmen, by the producers. In other words, every thirteen persons in our city not in the traffic must (or rather do) support one person dependent upon the traffic. It would be cheaper and better, if we would ODlydo it to levy a tax upon the laboring men engaged in useful toil, to keep this population of 1.000 persons in complete idleness, than to keep them ns we do.

After a careful investigation, I find that it costs the people of our city more than $250,000 per year for liquor. Such expenditure is worse than a fruitless waste of money. It not only produces nothing (but crime and misery), but aotually incapacitates and in* juries those who indulge. The time, money and energy spent in and upon the liquor traffic in our city would pay the city's debt in one year; would build a harbor at Wolf lake in one year; would pave every street in our oitv in two years, and, if spent in locating industries, would locate a dozen good factories in our city each year. Ninety-five per cent of all crime is caused directly or indirectly by drink. The police records of our city show that more than 90 per cent, of all the offenses committed are the results of intemperance and that our police force, maintained at an expense of $15,000 a year, is almost wholly and exclusively employed in watching and canng for men, women ana children affected by drink. 1 know of citiee as large as ours which do not have and do not need more than three policemen. Their people are not, naturally, more peaceful nor law-abiding than ours; bat they have fewer saloons. It oan safely be asserted that nine-tenths of all crime misery, Want, head-ache and heartaches are produced by the drink habit. Every thoughtful man hopes and prays that the evil nfay grow less and less, and that it may eventually be eliminated. Every person of respectability, Jee, every person of sense, deep own in his own heart will say, discourage the traffic, lessen the temptation, lead us not into temptation, but deliver os from evil. And yet, because there

happen to be two or three vhundred men in our city who wish to make a living off the traffic, and because they are organized and are active and may exert, politically or otherwise, some influence, our ministers are, at least, diplomatic, our newspapers silent and our public officials influenced, if not controlled, in the performance of their official acts. Do our police not have enough to do? Are there not enough drunkenness, rowdyism, wife-beat-ing, fighting, quarreling and gambling in our city? Have we not now too many saloons, too much time, money and manhood wasted in and upon the traffic? Are there not now too many places of temptation for our boys and girls and too many headquarters for criminals, bums, loafers and lewd women? Can any one give any good reason why the traffic should be encouraged or others induced to enter it? Upon what theory is the license fee to be reduced, unless it is to encourage the traffic, or to favor those engaged in the business? Upon what theory are they to be favored at the expense of the workingmen, the taxpayer and all other citizens? Whatever is good and beneficial to the community ought to be encouraged and cheapened so that the people can get what they want without much effort. Whatever is bad or detrimental to the community ought to be discouraged and made expensive. I shall be, all good men will be, and all men ought to be, in favor of the community and its welfare. It is a well-known and wellestablished fact that high license diminishes the number of saloons. By diminishing the number, it gives those who do engage in the business a comparative monopoly. Monopolies can fix the price of their goods. So that if S2OO or $250 were charged for a license, the saloon keeper could recoup the extra cost by giving small glasses; and the smaller the glasses the better it would be for their customers. And thus they would be able to replenish the treasury, relieve the taxpayer and benefit the drinker without loss to themselves. Furthermore, it is a well-known fact that a great majority of those who support the liquor traffic and cause so much trouble, misery and expense, pay but little tax except in the way of contributing to the license fund. Why should they not bear some of the burdens they produce, and especially as the more expensive the drink the less they could buy and the better off they would be.