Peninsula Enterprise, April 4, 1896

Pen Pictures of Metompkin People.

Moral -- Alcohol

EDITOR ENTERPRISE:

The spirit and courteous tone of "Taxpayer and Voter" are most commendable. But awful are the moral pictures of our people that he exhibits to the public. Metompkin district is a most desirable place -- "to emigrate from" if half he paints is true. Metompkinites, look at your pictures under "local option" -- by which, he means "no license," for local option prevails, whether a district goes "dry" or "wet."

Photograph 1: -- Behold among others, "some good people," who vote against license, "among the first to cry out for stimulants." Why did you cry out, good people? If you had "seven" chances to get a drink for every "one" chance you had before, and "more was sold then than now," why did you not stop crying and quench the thirst of your burning throats? Were you too "good" to join the other drinkers? If so, was whiskey closed against your purchase abroad? Or a way lacking to get it here? All you now drink, comes from other counties, or states. "Good people," if whiskey overflowed your community at that very time, was it not the dear bar-room for which you were crying, instead of the "stimulant?"

Photograph 2: -- Behold the merchants, of our district, with but "few exceptions," as a class of deceiving law-breakers. Are you the merchants of to-day, or do we deal with honest men, who have rightly succeeded those who unblushingly labeled falsehoods on their goods? We are interested in knowing. For the "merchant" who will cheat and defy his State, will cheat his customers, if opportunity offers.

Photograph 3: -- Behold "boys and young men, carrying flasks who never did before." Proof against bar-rooms, they succumb to -- "local option."

Photograph 4: -- See "liquor sold" at social, political, festive, religious -- in fact, "liquor sold at all gatherings."

Photograph 5: -- Behold, -- but "tell in not in Gath," liquor sold in all church meetings. No line, no limit is drawn. The bald, bold statement is, that it was "sold at all gatherings and church meetings, as never before." Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Baptist, Methodists of Metompkin district, how do you like your pictures, as drawn by this advocate of the bar room?

Photograph 6, is a great composite picture of the bar-room as the mighty, moral agency of Metompkin district. Our friend charges the decadence of morals and increase of evils that he pictures to the lack of licensed bar-rooms. He makes this a plea for their continuance. If his logic is sound, -- and he proves it to his own satisfaction -- then, the more we multiply the bar-room, the better for character, conduct, and communities. Behold, people of Metompkin, the moral agency that reformed you! Your "gatherings," "church meetings," "boys and young men," your "good people," and bad "merchants," all and everything, up lifted on the great wave of moral reform by -- the bar-room! And down you will drop again, if the bar room falls by "no license." So he warns you.

The people of this district deny the prevalence of such ungovernable outcrying, law breaking spirit and appetite as our friend pictures during "local option" -- as he terms it. But, if so, he only pictures the fruit growing on a tree that rooted itself in the bar-room, before local option prevailed against the saloon. Into its patrons, it educates and fosters the drinking habit. Do not point to the fruit of the bar-room and call it the fruit of "local option." When the mother is shut up, the weanlings squeal. But shutting up the mother did not cause the appetite, nor spirit that possesses them. And this is true of us, as human beings. Cutting off a source of evil, does not implant the seeds of that evil in human hearts, nor infuse its characteristics into human deeds.

Our friend asks, among other direct questions, "Is it not a fact that local option causes people to lie more and commit perjury?" Of course he means the absence of licensed bar-rooms. I answer, no, except as it
may relate to a small, depraved class of the people. The liar may "lie" more, perhaps, and the already perjured heart find a new outward expression in spoken, or acted perjury. But those already sound at the core of veracious integrity, can never be made rotten at the core by "local option." It is still true that, "out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh" its truths, or falsehoods.

"Does local option stop the sale of liquor?" No, my friend, not absolutely. Nor can we stop stealing by the laws against theft. Nor murders by the laws against taking human life. To regard a law as useless, or inoperative in its benefits, because of its violations, would neutralize and expunge every law on our statute books. Men who have no self respect, care nothing for the respect of others, care nothing for laws -- human or divine, can be found to sell it. From what you say, such men swarm in Metompkin district. But here are the advantages, morally:

1st, -- Its illicit sale is exclusively in the hands of bad men who defy the law. Now, the worse the man is who sells it, the less is his influence. The better the man, the greater his influence over his patrons, especially the young. The young man that buys of the law-breaker, holds him in contempt, as he buys. Under license, there are many worthy, self-respecting men that sell it. Some are blind to evil. Some see it, and feel its burden on their consciences. Their influence is tremendous. But all such men will stop selling it. I know one to-day, that would not attend a meeting, nor contribute to the fund his colleagues are raising to defeat the dry vote, in April next. He says, "if the majority are for continuing license, I shall continue to sell. If otherwise, I shall stop selling." That is what every law-abiding, honest man in the business will say, and do. The dishonest law-breaker, despised by his customers, can exert no influence for evil, like that of these men when they are protected by the law.

2d, -- The law-breaker cannot surround its sale with the enticements and potent attractions of the saloon. The sulking, sneaking methods of his selling, make no appeal to our "boys and young men." They know and feel the degrading shame of stooping and stealing to his plane and place.

3rd, -- You get rid of the crowds, noise, and sometimes disorder of the bar-rooms. Banished from publicity and the highway, its illicit sale seeks concealment. The very safety of the seller necessitates silence and privacy, as he defies the law.

4, -- Whatever may be said of the drinking, there will not be so much drunkenness.

5th, -- The saloon, with its social features and treating, is the bane of some men that might otherwise reform. The outlaw cannot furnish these conditions with its sale.

As to the railroad, or express company, do they bring the bar-room stock free of charge, now? And who pays them? The man that drinks it at the bar, -- the consumer. The customers of the bar-keeper, pay the first costs, the freight, the cost of the license, the rent, fuel, furnishings of the bar-room, and then add to it, the profits of the bar-keeper. But what our friend calls local option, takes every expense off the drinker, except first costs and freight. Any man "able and willing to pay for it," can buy it "without committing crime." Food is a necessity: Whiskey is not. Local "stores" are necessary. Bar-rooms are not. The U. S. government taxes whiskey, as a high, nonessential luxury. If the drinkers, rich and poor, of Accomac, can pay this tax and all the prime costs, the freight bills and income of the seller, and then add to it, enough money to run the whole system of bar-rooms in Accomac, why under "local option" cannot they more easily buy this luxury, when they are no longer supporting the whole system of saloons, in addition to paying for their whiskey? Under dry conditions, they pay for the luxury, pay the freight or expressage, and save all the other costs, they had been paying heretofore.

UNUS.

Law and Order League of Chincoteague.

Moral -- AlcoholMoral -- Vigilantism

MR. EDITOR:

Our people having decided at the polls eight years ago that no public saloon should exist in our midst, and being fully determined that no such abominable things as the so called "speakeasies" shall exist in our midst in defiance of our local option laws, and to prove our strength and show the sentiment of the people against such violations of the law, have organized themselves into a society, called the Law and Order League of Chincoteague, which now has a membership of 108, and have adopted the following resolutions:

1. That we hereby give our names to stand by this League with readiness to help enforce the law in any way possible, pledging ourselves that if we see or hear anything that will be of any importance to the League in enforcing the law to report it to the chairman.

2. That our League meet the second Monday evening in each month and any other time that the chairman sees proper to call a meeting, and that the preachers announce it from their pulpits the preceding Sunday.

3. That this League have a doorkeeper, and that he shall admit no one unless he is a member, or wishes to join after hearing the rules read.

4. That any member who is known to give away our secret plans or to work against the progress of the League be expelled from our midst.

And we beg leave to submit further that we are up and doing as will be seen by the indictments to come before our next grand jury court -- and that no trouble or expense will be spared by us in carrying out the objects of the League.

COMMITTEE.