caused in this town by the stimulating effect of beefsteak bought in a butcher shop? What other institution in the world is there that necessitates officers to arrest its products, and prisons in which to lock them up?

I was in an Illinois town last winter when a gentleman came and asked me to ride through the city with him. In riding through the city I was astonished to see how their dramshops were located; three in a bunch, the bunches being in different parts of the city. I said to the gentleman, "These liquor dealers must be fools; why do they open their grogshops so near each other?”

He said, "We make them get in bunches, or else we will not license them."

He answered, "If three of them are together one policeman can watch the three. If they were scattered all over town we should require a larger police force."

Speaking with the chief of police of one of the largest cities of this country, a man who drinks liquor and who is a license man, I asked, "If you abolish every drinking-place in this city, how many policemen would be required?" He replied, "A hundred night watchmen could do our work." They have at the present time more than twenty-five hundred armed, disciplined and uniformed policemen.

No honest man can doubt that the liquor shops of this country are primary schools of crime.

At a fair, sometime since. I addressed a very large audience in the forenoon; in the afternoon I was walking about the grounds looking at the exhibition when a man came to me and said:

"Your name is Finch; you are the man who talked temperance this forenoon ?"

"Yes; or prohibition."

He said, "Well, it all means the same thing."
I told him some people thought so.

"Now," said he, "I do not want to insult you." I told him that was exceedingly fortunate for him, and me, too—it might save unpleasantness.

He said, "I am a liquor-dealer, and the managers of this fair did a dirty, mean thing in getting you here. This fair represents all the industries, and mine is a legitimate business. For them to get anybody here, at a public fair, to bring into disrepute one of the industries of the county, is mean."

I said, "It does look as though there was reason for your complaint. My friend, I believe you have been insulted, and, if I was in your place, I would go over to the president's office, and kick up the biggest row they ever had on this ground. You say this is for all the industries of the county." I took out of my pocket a premium list, and said, "Here is a premium for the nicest horses, the nicest cows, the best calves; for chickens, ducks, turkeys and geese; for beets, turnips, squashes and potatoes; for farm machinery; for all kinds of ladies' work; for cheese and butter. The managers of this fair

seem to have offered a premium to encourage every industry but yours. Now I would raise a row." He asked, "What do you mean?"

You

I replied, "You do a legitimate business. are manufacturing and turning your products out all the time. They ought to offer a premium on some of your finished jobs. They ought to put down $25 for the best specimen of bummer made in a grogshop in this county; $15 for the next, and $10 for the next, and a red ribbon for the fourth. If you

will go with me to the president we will give him fits for not doing it."

The liquor-dealer straightened up, and said I was a damned fool.

They say temperance men talk gush and nonsense. But I answer, the liquor business can no longer plead the baby act in this country. It must stand on the same plane of political economy with every other trade.

In the west, since I have lived here—and I have lived here some years—I have heard some men say that in New York city the Democrats stuffed the ballot-boxes and hired repeaters to vote "early and often." You ask me if they did this. Undoubtedly they did. Up and down the land we have heard men talking about the purity of the ballot-box. People say, “Does not corruption exist there?" Of course it does. If it exists, what is the cause of it? Did you ever stop to think? There is no such corruption in the country districts. You can not corrupt

the farmers, you can not corrupt the sober men. If corruption exists at the ballot-box there must be cause for it. What is the cause?

There stands a workman; he does not drink liquor; he has money in his pocket; he has a good job; his brain is clear; his wife and family are happy. For the first time he goes to a drinking-place and drinks. During four or five years he goes down and down, and bye and bye he gets reckless, loses his business, and his family have to beg. He is an outcast on the street. On an election morning, there this man stands, on a street corner, ragged, dirty, sick; craving for something to drink; his stomach so hungry for the poison that he would sell his soul for a drink of liquor. The only thing that man possesses which will bring money is his vote. Do you suppose that man, with morals gone, reputation gone--starving, ragged and hungry, will vote like an American citizen, according to his convictions, if he can get money for voting otherwise? No.

The dramshop is the cause of most of the corruption in our great centres of population. Talk about purifying the ballot-box in our great cities! The ballot-box never will be purified until the voter is purified. You may pass election laws and fence around the ballot-box, but the only hope of a pure ballot-box is a pure citizenship.

What is true of New York is true of almost every great city. In the cities it is doubtful to-day whether republican government is a success.

The

debauchery of the voter, the corruption of the ballot box is an effect; and the cause is the American dramshop. The tendency of the liquor interest in this country is to degrade men; to debauch men; to stuff ballot-boxes; elect mean men to office, and in every sense of the word to tear down and ruin American institutions; consequently it is a question in this country whether the American system of government shall live, or whether this curse shall destroy it. Now, as to the remedies. One man asks, "Has the government the right to destroy this business?" A friend interrupted me once to say: "Mr. Finch, I have a natural right to sell liquor.' I said, "Please say it again and say He did.

I said, "What do you mean by it?"
He did not answer.

it slowly."

if you mean any

Said I, "I suppose you mean, thing, that in a state of nature, you had a right to sell it; that is, when you were a wild man you had a right to sell it? And who would you sell whisky to, in a state of nature? You can not sell whisky unless you have somebody to sell it to, and that would be a state of association. You could not trade unless men come together to trade, and that would be the formation of society. All trade is the child of society. If trade is the child of society, society has the same right as any parent. If trade will not behave itself, society may take it across its knee. If that will not do, it may do more."