from that previously mentioned, is that they do not pursue methods calculated to bring them in contact with the persons whom they seek to benefit. If there were no liquor-buyers, there could be no liquor sellers. So long as there are persons disposed to be liquor-buyers, there will be liquor-sellers, in spite of all the statutes and constitutional provisions that ever have been or ever can be enacted. The liquor crusade (I intend to use the word in no offensive sense) is now directed toward the overthrow of the liquor-seller, and not to the rescue of the liquor-buyer. I could greatly regard and admire the temperance missionary who should seek out the drunkard at his home or in the grogshop, and endeavor to persuade him of the evil of his ways, of his power to reform, and of his capacity to become a respectable, respected, and useful member of society, and who makes the attempt to find such objects of interest for him as will make his home or some lounging-place as attractive to him as the grog-shop. Such missionaries are scarce, however. The usual temperance work consists in occasionally getting up meetings which respectable people, not drunkards, are solicited to attend, and at which some one holds forth on the evils of intemperance (which all are ready to admit), and dwells on the necessity for further legislation or a constitutional amendment. Not a suggestion is made that it is desirable to organize committees to solicit funds to pay for the time and services of such a missionary as aforesaid, or committees to aid him in such work. If by any chance the meeting is not devoted to a consideration of the law, and an effort has been made, or is made, to get hold of the drunkards and reform them, they are more than as likely as not to be put forward at once on their profession of reform, to tell how drunk they used to get, and to abuse persons who do not join the movement, do not believe in prohibition, and have never been drunk. Temperance work comes, too, in waves like our "cold snaps," and, after a season of intense excitement, dies away, leaving to be sure a residuum of good, but also furnishing a majority of backsliders among the reformed, to the regret of the judicious and the delight of the scoffers. What is needed is not more but different law, and sustained and unobtrusive, not spasmodic and demonstrative effort for the reform and rehabilitation of drunkards. When the history of temperance reform for the last fifty years is considered, the progress made seems astounding; but it must be remembered that the greater advance by far was made before and not since the enactment of prohibitory laws, and by persuasion, not by force.
Before going further I wish to say that I yield to no one in my appreciation of the fact that crime, wretchedness, poverty, and squalor, inevitably follow the excessive use of intoxicating drink, and that any use of intoxicants is dangerous on account of the liability that it may become excessive. I am also fully of the opinion that any law can be justified that will prevent such use of them, and, if I had the power, I would destroy every drop of alcoholic drink on the face of the earth.
