tection be extended to this unfortunate class of citizens of the United States which is secured to the savage wards of our government."

The court here charges that the results of the saloon affect all persons, without regard to race, age or sex and its results are declared to be nothing but evil. The ravages upon society, charged to the saloon, by this court, include, idleness, poverty, pauperism, crime, insanity, disease, death, broken homes, domestic unhappiness, vice, prisons, almshouses, orphanages, mental and physical deterioration of the human race, public expense without any adequate return, and the corruption of public officers, and then, the court sums it all up by saying that it is "the great peril of American institutions." Then, if the saloon be lawful at common law, we may and do have a lawful peril to American institutions. On this basis the great peril to American institutions is lawful.

Courts have said, time and time again, that whatever invades the fundamental rights of citizens is unlawful, in the absence of any statute, and also that legislatures can not make lawful, by statute, anything, which, because of its inherent. evils, invades the fundamental rights of citizens.

If the saloon, in view of the estimate placed upon it by the Supreme Court of Iowa, does not inherently invade the fundamental rights of a citizen, then, nothing ever did or ever can. A midnight raid of whitecappers and incendiaries would be lawful on this basis, in the absence of a statute against it.

Prof. George R. Stewart, president of the State

University of Tennessee, says of the saloon: "The liquor traffic, which consumes $14,000,000 every year, is a monstrous snake, crawling through our beautiful country, devouring here a man, here a village, here a mayor, here a town council, here a board of county officials, here a state legislature.

* * *

"You will find that 70 per cent. of the divorce business is directly traceable to the saloon. Poverty, the struggle for bread, is directly traceable to the liquor traffic. Back of the shattered home, the ruined life, you will find liquor, liquor, liquor! "Fifty years from now we will tell it to our children as a joke that the government of the United States once actually licensed men to sell liquor and debauch other men. The highway robber takes a man's money and leaves him nothing. And the highway robber is better than the saloon keeper or any man who will vote for the saloon keeper. The highway robber takes his dollar and leaves his body unhurt. The saloon keeper takes his dollar. He hurts his body, his mind, his nerves, his reputation, his character— ruins him for making another dollar. The saloon keeper puts his hand into the man's bosom and pulls out his immortal soul and throws it into hell."

If this estimate be correct and the saloon is lawful, in the absence of specific legislative condemnation, then it is lawful to devour men individually and collectively, lawful to corrupt mayors, city councils, county officers and legislatures, lawful to take from men their nerves, their mind, their characters and their lives. No one would assent to this proposition directly, but it is indirectly affirmed,

whenever the saloon is declared to be lawful at common law.

The reasonable conclusion is that the saloon is unlawful in the absence of any legislative action, and it is so very unlawful that no legislative enactment can make it lawful without invading the fundamental rights of citizens.

CHAPTER XVII

PROHIBITION BY LEGISLATIVE ENACTMENT THE ONLY LOGICAL SOLUTION OF THE

SALOON PROBLEM

Even from a purely legal standpoint, legislative prohibition is the only logical solution of the saloon problem. A strenuous and persistent effort has been made by liquor journals and saloon advocates, for a year or more, to create the impression that the position of the writer, that the saloon is inherently and consitutionally unlawful and a nuisance, would completely withdraw and entirely remove the subject from the realm of legislative action. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Murder is unlawful in the absence of any legislation whatever, but the fact that it is, does not, in any sense, nor to any extent, remove it from the province of legislative consideration.

Its inherently unlawful status is a most persuasive reason for the infliction of just penalties, and this can be done only by and through legislative provisions. For years the Supreme Court of Indiana consistently held "bucket shop" gambling to be unlawful at common law, but those engaged in the business could not be punished for the offense, because the legislature had provided no penalty.

So, the fact, that the saloon is within itself unlawful, is an invitation, a call to the legislature to act, and prescribe the penalty for its operation, and that is all that is meant by prohibition.

Murder, stealing and burglary are prohibited,