Sober by Act of Parliament — Reading Companion

THE STATE AS SALOON KEEPER.

During the last few months South Carolina has been the scene of a remarkable experiment in liquor legislation, which has attracted considerable attention from social reformers everywhere. Though professedly based on the Gothenburg system, the Dispensaries Act differs from its prototype in many important respects. As in Sweden, the element of individual profit is eliminated, and the control of the trade is taken out of the hands of private persons; but in place of the drink shops being conducted by the municipalities, they are placed under the direct supervision of the State Government. The saloon has been abolished, and its place taken by dispensaries, where liquor can only be obtained in bottles for consumption off the premises. All public inducements to tippling have been removed at a sweep; and while it is possible for any sober adult to obtain what liquor he wishes, no one is pecuniarily interested in forcing intoxicants on him. The Act was in operation for too short a time to allow anything definite to be said as to its success or failure. It received the fiercest opposition from an influential body of politicians, and from the more lawless section of the community; and the dispossessed saloon keepers, with all the following they could command, naturally did their best to cause it to fail.

In the election of 1892 the prohibition party showed great activity, and succeeded in obtaining a majority at the polls. The question of the control of the liquor traffic occupied a foremost place at the meeting of the new Legislature. Many members were in favour of out-and-out prohibition, and a Bill was introduced to make the manufacture or sale of drink illegal. But, after considerable debate on the subject, a new measure was hastily brought before the Senate, at the instigation of the Governor, the Hon. Benjamin R. Tillman, as a compromise between the views of the extreme prohibitionists and those who held that, in the present condition of public opinion, prohibition would be largely inoperative, and consequently injurious to the temperance cause. The measure was rushed through the Legislature with little or no debate, and at once received the sanction of the Governor.

Governor Tillman is undoubtedly a remarkable man, of bold initiative and great force of character; and it is impossible to understand the situation in South Carolina without knowing something about him. Within the last decade he has risen from obscurity to the supreme power in the State, and to-day he is "boss" of South Carolina. He first came to the front in 1885, by his bitter denunciations of the local Democratic rulers. He is himself a Democrat, but this did not prevent him from bringing the most serious charges against the members of the aristocratic ring that held the reins of Government. He charged them with being the enemies of the poor and oppressors of the people, whose one aim was to conduct public affairs so as to benefit themselves. At first the high-class politicians treated him with a half-amused, half-contemptuous scorn, sneered at what they were pleased to call his ignorant talk, and held his language up to ridicule. And in truth, if reports may be believed, his vigour of speech gave his enemies abundant cause to blaspheme. He was not particular in his choice of phrases, and he did not hesitate to pile up the most picturesque and sanguinary expressions in describing his opponents.

But the people rallied around him. "I am rough and uncouth, but before Almighty God I am honest," he said to them; and they believed him. The poorer country folks were his first followers, then the Farmers' Alliance came to his support, and before the old politicians had ceased to wonder at the audacity of the young man, they began to learn that their days of power were over. In 1890 he stood for the Governorship in opposition to the regular Democratic candidate. He stumped the State, and met with a most enthusiastic reception. He was elected by a large majority, and the power of the old ring was, for a time at least, broken. Two years later he was once more elected to the same post, and until he tried to carry out the Dispensaries Act his authority was supreme in the State. One thing is certain: if Governor Tillman cannot secure obedience to the law, it will be difficult to find any one else who can.