A PUBLIC WRONG CAN NOT LEGALLY BE A PRIVATE RIGHT

Then, the inquiring mind naturally is inclined to ask, can that which is universally conceded to be and generally judicially declared to be a public wrong legally be a private right? Is such a thing lawful? If so, there is such a thing as a lawful public wrong and injury. Certainly such a conclusion is not a logical deduction. If it is not lawful, then the next question is, can the legislature, by an enactment, make a public wrong a private right? Can a citizen lawfully establish a private trade in a public injury? Certainly not. Can a state legislature authorize the establishment of a trade in a public menace or danger? No, because to do so, would authorize an invasion of both the private and public rights of citizens.

No court has ever, in so many words, said that this may be legally done; they have always asserted the contrary in direct statements; but, when they place an estimate upon the saloon that makes of it a public menace inherently and then say that it is a lawful business, they, by indirection, reverse the direct statement. Courts have upheld and sustained the validity of prohibitory, local option and remonstrance statutes, and always on the ground that the saloon is inherently dangerous to public morals and public order, and, in doing so, they affirm that they judicially know such to be the inherent character of the saloon; they do not require the fact to be charged and proven.

Dealing with the right to arbitrarily exclude a saloon from a township in Indiana and affirming

the right to so do upon the ground that the business is attended with danger to the community, the Supreme Court of Indiana, quoting from Sherlock vs. Stuart, 96 Mich. 193, and Crowley vs. Christenson, 137 U. S. 86, says: "No one possesses an inalienable or constitutional right to keep a saloon for the sale of intoxicating liquor; to keep a saloon for the sale of intoxicating liquor is not a natural right to pursue an ordinary calling; there is no inherent right in a citizen to thus sell intoxicating liquor by retail; it is not a privilege of a citizen of the state or of the United States." This statement analyzed and segregated declares that to keep a saloon for the sale of intoxicating liquors is not:

1. A constitutional right.

2. An inalienable right.

3. An inherent right.

4. A natural right to pursue an ordinary calling. 5. A privilege of a citizen of the state.

6. A privilege of a citizen of the United States. If it be a right at all, it is certainly of some other kind and springs from some other source. This proposition is surely axiomatic; it proves itself. When the courts deny to the saloon these rights and affirm that it may be wholly prohibited, they, in legal effect, declare it to be a public menace, and from this two other propositions are inevitable:

1. The saloon, being a public menace, is inherently unlawful.

2. Being inherently a public menace, the saloon can not be made a private right by a legislative act.

A wrong is not a lawful right, and it can not be made such by legislative action.

By the use of judical terms, the courts have declared the saloon an outlaw. If it were not so regarded judicially, it could not be unconditionally suppressed.

On September 5, 1907, before the Northwestern M. E. Conference, at Greencastle, Indiana, Governor Hanly said of the saloon: "It is an enemy well worth while. It has great wealth. It is adroit and cunning. It is resourceful. It touches the financial interests of many men. It is desperate. It observes no law, human or divine. It violates legislative enactments and tramples upon the most solemn constitutional inhibitions. The rules of civilized warfare are to it a meaningless jingle of idle words. It is a black flag. It is an outlaw. Its god is Mammon. It has no religion but the greed of gain. No love that the lust of gold does not corrupt. No pity that avarice does not strangle."

On the next day, the Indianapolis News editorially endorsed the statements of the Governor, said it was a "true key note," and added: “In a word, we are dealing with men who are rebels against both the moral and the statute law, men who seek to rule through alliances with corrupt and cowardly politicians. Opposing prohibition and favoring regulation, they yet refuse to be regulated, and violate -with the consent and connivance of men in office -every law enacted to regulate and control the traffic. This is why the people are so thoroughly aroused. It seems to them to be a question whether they or the liquor-dealers shall rule. No one can

study the problem of municipal government in this country without realizing that one of the most corrupting influences in local government is this same liquor traffic."

These statements are merely elaborations of the estimate placed upon the saloon, by the courts, when they affirm that it may be prevented altogether.

On June 25, 1907, the Indiana Supreme Court, while acknowledging that danger and evil to the peace and good order of society attend and inhere in the saloon, held that it was right and legitimate at common law, and incidentally suggested that to think otherwise is to entertain strange and singular views.

On June 26th, the Indianapolis News endorsed the opinion of the Supreme Court and said that its statements were as clear as the axioms of geometry. By endorsing the language of the court and the governor both, the News puts itself in the attitude of affirming that the saloon is a lawful outlaw.

The various statements of the courts, when put together on the basis of reason, mean the same thing.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SALOON IS NOT A CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT

"No one possesses a constitutional right to keep a saloon for the sale of intoxicating liquor."

The above language has been used by the Supreme Court of Indiana in three different opinions; it has been used by the Supreme Court of the United States and by the Supreme Courts of Kansas and Michigan and possibly others. It is not a mere, idle expression; it means much. It can hardly be regarded as a casual remark. It is nothing more than fair to presume, from the frequency of its use, that the courts intended the full meaning of the

statement.

But what is the meaning of the statement? By the method of circumlocution, we may ascertain what the courts have declared to be constitutional rights. Section one of article fourteen of the Constitution of the United States provides: "No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the law.”

In State vs. Scougal, 51 N. W. 858, the Supreme Court of South Dakota said: "These constitutional provisions are not mere glittering generalities, but constitute sacred guarantees to the citizen that his liberty and his right to the pursuit of happiness shall not be abridged, and his right to his property