The Pastor, the Saloon, and the Pulpit Campaign in Newport

To the Editor of the Miner.

Last week there appeared in The Miner an advertisement by the saloon interests of this town, an article incorporating some of the arguments put forth against prohibition by the Rev. William A. Wasson.

A reading of the original article by any fair-minded intelligent person will satisfy such a one that it has the unmistakable ring of the hired advocate, and the ecclesiastical sheep's clothing of the reverend does not conceal the claws of the wolf.

The eclat with which the saloon forces have received this Wasson article is of itself sufficient to show it wearing the badge of the hypocrite.

The article teems with falsehood and misrepresentation, with arguments most palpably fallacious.

For twenty years have been closely identified with the courts and law offices, was admitted to the bar in 1893 at Chicago, and have been in my time identified with some of the leading and most able attorneys in the country, and I must say that the suggestions which Wasson makes for the legal control of the saloon exhibit an ignorance on his part of fundamental yet elementary law as to make him the laughing stock of unbiased learned lawyers and legislators.

Again, he emphasizes the discarding of prohibition by a number of New England states nearly fifty years ago. And would insist that the recital of this ancient bit of history forever settles the question of prohibition for all generations, notwithstanding our superior enlightenment, and that the saloon today has assumed the proportions of a curse far beyond what it was fifty years ago. Fifty years ago the per capita consumption of drink in this country was only 5 gallons, while in 1907 it had reached the appalling amount of 23 gallons per capita, or, in other words, the amount consumed for each man, woman and child in the country had increased in 1907 to nearly five times what it was fifty years ago. Is the world, with the changed conditions which we have, the greater information, with two dozen institutions of learning now to every one that existed fifty years ago, and with this evil multiplied by nearly five, in no better situation to decide present day problems than were they of fifty years ago?

We know considerably more than did the people of fifty years ago. They were setting type by hand; we set it with a linotype machine. They laboriously wrote with a pen and thought they were doing fine if they wrote twenty words a minute; we use a typewriter and write sixty. But why enumerate the things which show our superior enlightenment over the people of fifty years ago? Everybody knows it except Wasson—and the "barkeep."

But let us note the falsehood of the Rev. Wasson in this connection, which is only one of many in the article. The truth only half told may constitute a deliberate falsehood.

The article in last week's Miner states: "The states that deserted the prohibition ranks are the ones that seem to be least affected by the present 'dry wave.' The assumption is that they are satisfied with one experience." That was the conclusion that Wasson by misrepresentation wanted the people to draw. He says in his article: "Prohibition is least popular where it is best known." And he by his article would have people believe that in the states that adopted prohibition fifty years ago and abandoned it, that they have ever since been exulting over their rejection of prohibition, and that nowhere in the confines of these states is there the least disposition to make any "dry" territory or adopt prohibition to the extent of banishing the saloon. He is a base deceiver in this regard. Let us see what the fact is with them today.

Vermont is one of them, which he boasts has had enough of saloon abolition. Yet in one year, 1903, 38 saloons were abolished in Vermont, and there are now only 52 saloons left in the entire state. Of the 9,655 square miles in Vermont 8,419 is "dry." About 300,000 people within the borders of the state are living in no-license territory, while the population of the state is only about 350,000. In 1903 they adopted a local option law. That year the majority in favor of license was 5,222. In 1904 the majority in favor of no-license was 7,008. In 1905 the majority in favor of no-license was 6,813. In 1906 the majority in favor of no-license was 8,697. In 1907 the majority in favor of no-license was 8,989, and in 1908 the no-license majority was over 9,000. Of the 246 towns of the state 219 are "dry."

Now, in what state would prohibition be best known? The answer is found in the statement of the saloon article of last week that: "The trial of prohibition by states that finally rejected it has ranged from three years in Nebraska to 53 years in Vermont." Then Vermont should know prohibition best. Is Rev. Wasson truthful when he says: "Prohibition is generally least popular where it is best known?" And is he truthful when he says: "There could be no stronger evidence of the failure of prohibition than the fact that seven (one of which is Vermont) of the eight states that adopted the system fifty years ago have since abandoned it and gone back to the policy of license and regulation?" And this in the face of the fact that Vermont, which he boasts of as one of the seven prohibition haters and as being a state of "license and regulation," has eight-ninths of its territory "dry," without a license, and 219 out of the 246 towns in the state are "dry." Space will not permit taking up in detail the others of the seven states. But, briefly, Massachusetts, one of them, has 60 per cent of its territory "dry." Twenty of the 33 cities of the state and 260 of its 321 towns grant no licenses. New Hampshire, another of Wasson's claimed prohibition hating states, has 269,801 of its population living in "dry" territory, with 141,196 living in "wet" territory.

But space bars me from continuing the exposure of this fakir at this time. Next Sunday evening at 8 o'clock at the Congregational church I shall show the sham and humbug of this Wasson article more fully, and I hope every voter who is contemplating voting "wet" will come out and hear the facts, as this Wasson article has been accepted with glee by the saloon forces as being the best thing that they have been able to get hold of for the purpose of pulling the wool over the eyes of the people.

Rev. F. R. Margetts. Newport, Wash., Aug. 23, 1909.