The Council's Saloon Charity
Aberdeen’s city fathers are accused of legal gymnastics by granting a liquor license under the guise of helping a struggling mother.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
When a man has performed an act of charity, has done his full duty by his fellow man, no praise is so sweet, so relished and enjoyed as the approbation of his own conscience. Broad-minded men love to benefit their species, and to do a kind action will go to almost any length that good may come of it. No doubt such noble and ingenuous sentiments permeated the breasts of Aberdeen's councilmen when they granted a free license to Mrs. Sophia Johnson to engage in the motherly business of selling liquor that she might raise her offspring in the atmosphere of sobriety and righteousness. It was but a week ago some of these same gentlemen inveighed bitterly against the 'charity act' when the life of the Chamber of Commerce was at stake, yet they valiantly fly to the rescue of a poor lone woman who wants to sell liquor on a license several times transferred and hawked about the city. Such action is of more than doubtful legality, and, in the opinion of a large majority of our citizens, does not subserve the best interests of the city. The South side should not have a saloon until it has police protection.
“They valiantly fly to the rescue of a poor lone woman who wants to sell liquor on a license several times transferred and hawked about the city.”
This 1892 editorial captures the classic tension between local ‘charity’ and corruption in Aberdeen’s early governance. Even then, the community was debating the ethics of saloon placement and the influence of powerful interests on municipal licensing—a debate that mirrors modern local battles over zoning, business permits, and civic equity.
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