Jasper County Democrat, Volume 6, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 September 1903 — PROHIBITION IN KANSAS. [ARTICLE]

PROHIBITION IN KANSAS.

The State tax levy has been fixed at 30f cents on each hundred dollars valuation, against 29| cents last year.

The negro might do worse than to go back to his southern home. It is true that he may not enjoy the right of suffrage to such an extent ao he does in the north, but the southern man understands him better than anyone else. Climate, environment, and everything else will be in his favor, and the plow and hoe are the best tools on earth for him to carve out his future with. —Goodland Herald, (Repj

The contract for the Gault ditch, which will cut through the corners of Cass, Fulton, Pulaski and White counties, in length 22.16 miles, iffis been awarded to Robert 0. Hillis, of Logansport; consideration $53,242,67. At its widest point the ditch will be twenty-eight feet deep and seventy-six feet wide. Over 800,040 cubic yards of dirt will be ex*, cavated, the work to k be completed in two years.

Down at Greencastle the moral elements of the people held a mass meeting the other evening and protested against the city council’s proposed action of granting the use of the city|[streets for the exhibition of the Dixie Carnival Co., which showed here last week. Carnivals were bitterly denounced, and it was determind to get out an injunction against the using of the public streets for such purposes or to prosecute the carnival company for obstructing the streets, should it attempt to set up therein.

There is considerable kicking here as well as in our neighboring counties over the action of the State Board in raising the valuation of real estate and improvements. Of course this should result in a lower tax levy, both state and local, as the total increase in in valuation over the state must amount to many millions, but as a prominent citizen said in our hearing the other day, he had always noticed that a high 1 valuation meantjlots more taxes. The township levies were fixed i last Tuesday, and were generally made on assessments as heretofore returned, thus in most casestownship trustees will raise more funds than they had expected to. Regarding the county levy, the increased valuation in this county over last year will be about $2,000,000, or about one-fifth, and as the levy for county purposes last year wasso| cents —16 cents higher than that of two years previous thereto—it would seem that the . county council could easily reduce the levy to 40 cents, assuming that it will make a proportionately high levy with last year. t) fix the levy, and it would, be a ‘good idea for representative tax- | payers of the county to attend the I Session and make themselves heard f in thia matter.

Prohibition has been a law in Kansas for twenty-two years. There are thousands of voters there that never saw a saloon and in whose minds liquor selling is classed with stealing or any other crime. In the beginning the Republican party made the mistake of adopting prohibition as a party issue. This drove the Democrats to opposition on the grounds of “sumptuary legislation;” the result was to confuse the popular mind; it came to look pn prohibition as a mere question of party politics and not as a question of right and wrong and so the law was Fobbed of much of its majesty, and opposition to it was raised up that finally was powerful in overthrowing the Republicans. As a general result the status of the law to-day is this, according to a concise presentation of the subject in the Outlook by C. H. Matson: In three or four of the larger cities the law was never thoroughly enforced and to-day there are thirty or forty towns in which there are “joints” from which license is collected in the way of monthly fines of SSO or SIOO, it being understood that, the fine paid, the joints will not be disturbed for another month. This horrible hypocrisy has bred contempt for the law and for similar laws the violation of which is regarded as “smart.” There are towns in which it is impossible to convict a “joint” keeper, no matter what the evidence, and hence judicial procedure has fallen into contempt. The result of this is that outside of three or four large cities in which the saloon is openly established municipal campaigns are really campaigns on the liquor question as local option. If the “drys” win the “joints” are closed; if the “wets” win they are open. The difference between this result and the working of a local option law is that this breeds contempt for law. So Kansas has to-day under prohibition, local option plus contempt for law.

But this is not all. While the law is openly violated in perhaps twenty-five out of one hundred and five counties of the State, it is observed in the rest and an attempt to repeal it would cause a revolution. The question of “wet” and “dry” is no longer aligned with party. It has made a new issue for itself. The difference is that where a town goes “wet” under this law the selling of liquor is legally still prohibited, and the campaign amounts to a compact among the people to break the law, and there is corruption in the popular mind as a result, and also in the city government arising out of the assessment of fines against the joints. As to the effects of liquor or no liquor, no more striking example could be shown than the experience of the town of Hutchinson, 10,000 population. It had the illegal “joints” for years; then at an election went “dry,” and the law was enforced. The mayor makes this statement of the result:

For the first time in the history of the city of Hutchinson the Boating debt of the town has been reduced, duringthe past two years. The street fund has changed from a deficit of SB,OOO to a surplus of 14.000, and the general fund from a $15,000 deficit to a $5,000 deficit. Not one dollar of “joint” money went into the treasury in this time.

In the eight years prior, when the saloons were running, the Boating debt was increased by $75,1(00. Of this $55,000 was refunded and $20,000 was left over for us to pay. During part of that time as high as SI,OOO a month was collected from the “joints.” In two years the criminal docket of the district court originating from Hutchinson has practically disappeared. The total costs to county and cityof criminal cases originating in Hutchinson for two years will be less than SSOO, against probably $5,000 to SIO,OOO for each two years prior under the to run. Tax levies have been reduced, yet we voted one mill for a Carnegie library, increased electric lights from thirty-four to fortysix, and added twenty-one additi-

onal water hydrants and two miles of water mains to our water plant. We reduce® the police force, and our city has been free from the criminal element. A large portion of the money formerly spent in saloons or lost in gambling has gone into legitimate trade, and our merchants all report increased business. During two years not a woman or child has complained that her husdand’s, father’s or son’s wages were spent in a saloon or gambling den. And this, it may be said, is typical. There are counties where the law is enforced that 'have not had an occupant of'their county jails in eight years,.and where there are no poor farms because there are no paupers —Indianapolis News.