The Home and State (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 11, No. 15, Ed. 1 Saturday, September 11, 1909 Page: 1 of 8
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5c Copy, $1 Per Year
DALLAS, TEXAS, SEPT. 11th, 1909
Volume 11. Number 15
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HON. A. S. HAWKINS.
This gentleman is already in the field for Lieu-
tenant Governor and we judge from reports that
he is making his candidacy known all over Texas.
He is an honorable and high-minded man and he
stands firmly on the right side of all moral ques-
tions. He comes of good stock, his father having
been one of the leading ministers of this State
for a great many years. He is a lawye by pro-
fession, is strong intellectually and he hails from
that section of Texas—Midland—whose claims to
State office have not heretofore had the proper
recognition. The man who aspires to the Presi-
dency of the next State Senate will have to reck-
on very seriously with the Hon. A. S. Hawkins.
Childress, already dry, cast 1027 votes, 725 against
the saloons and 301 for saloons, being a majority
or 424 for prohibition, a vote of more than two to
one against the return of the saloons after having
been without them for five years. Only one pre-
cinct voted wei, and Childress City gave a pro
majority of 194, the exact vote being: pro 322, for
saloons 198
•Clay county, after trying the saloons for two
years, having gone wet two years ago, again
voted dry by 232 majority.
Here we have two counties, one dry for five
years, voting against the return of saloons by
more than two to one; while the other county,
after trying them for two years, votes them out
by a large majority. -The saloon is doomed. Once
rid of it and its corruption, these crime-producers
and tax-eaters seldom get a foothold again when
once they have been voted out. The people of
Texas are daily becoming more aroused and en-
lightened on the infamy of- the liquor traffic.
County after county, precinct after precinct, is
banishing the saloon. The saloon is on the run,
bur by no means in retreat. It has more than
nine lives and the people must be perpetually
on the alert or it will find some way to annul
the victory you have won. Texas is surely going
dry. On with the battle!
A ball player or a ball club that wins pennants
does not make its headquarters in a saloon. In
the Texas League is a certain ball club that is
gradually settling toward the bottom, whose man-
ager is said to own or be interested in two sa-
loons in his home town, and that his players cash
checks in one of his saloons. This team, when it
returns from a trip, is said to make a bee line
for a certain beer emporium, and the reason the
team is able to win more games at home than
on the road, is that it can, with the manager in-
terested in two saloons, fill the other team up
fuller than he fills his own. This does not mean
that the players come on the field tipsy. The
drinking is done after the game and on the even-
ing before, but the results of it show in the error
and hit columns and the dumb plays made next
day. When the grueling contests come at the
close of the season, then such a team naturally
gravitates to the bottom.
4 P
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An Illustr ed Family IFcekly
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The erudite and learned editors of certain
Texas dailies who have been vociferating most
eloquently within the past year on the “Demo-
cratic wisdom” of a “two-thirds” vote necessary
in order to s bmit an amendment to a State Con-
stitution, will doubtless be shocked to learn that
the principle was engrafted into the National Con-
stitution,., and from it incorporated into tne State
• Constitutions, by Alexander Hamilton, the Feder-
alist, because he “feared the turbulence of the
people,” and by Madison, who was “opposed to
innovation." Thus Hamilton, the father of the
“centralization” principle of government, was
just as much opposed to the people ruling as are
the liquor interests of Texas. Funny, isn’t it,
how the great Democratic(?) dailies are fighting
for Hamilton’s theory of centralization, for which
the Republican party of today stands, and don’t
know it.
The Home and State receives in exchange a
large number of he weeklies of Texas. These
papers are a credit to their publishers and edi-
tors. They are closer to the people than any
daily and have the confidence of their constitu-
ency. Thus they wield the greatest influence in
the journalism of the State, and when 75 per
cent of these weeklies espouse a proposition, the
dailies had just as well put in their time speculat-
ing on the number of spots on the sun for aught
they can do to stem the tide set in motion by the
country press. The editing of most of our week-
lies is a labor of love for the peop'e, while the
editing of most of our dailies is a labor of emolu-
ment for tne publisher. The people recognize
this and follow the teachings of the man who
lives their neighbor and who has proven himself
their friend. Take the country editor all over
the land and you will find him fighting the bat-
tles of the people, battling sincerely for moral
reforms, and wielding an influence corresponding
tg the respect and esteem in which his fellow-
citizens hold him. Take the country press of
lexas. You will find it clean and able, and often
there appears an editorial from some obscure pen
that is a gem of literary excellence. Eighty-five-
per cent of our State weeklies are lined up for
prohibition, State-wide and world-wide. The
Home and State feels honored in being one of the
weekly press of Texas. Press on, fellow editors;
you are doing a great service for your State, and
the bread you are casting on the waters will be
gathered up after many days.
BOTTLE-SCARRED VETERANS.
The latter part of August Dallas held a military
tourney and a troop of soldiers was sent up to
“educate” the people on matters military. The
affair was widely advertised and largely attend-
ed. The people flocked to see all the wonderful
stunts that were supposed to show the prowess of
men at arms. To the provincial eye, it all looked
well encrhand every khaki uniform was thought
to hold a soldier bold, inured to war’s alarms.
Among the troops were doubtless not a few who
would have welcomed the storming of a real ram-
part or who would have faced the grim mouths
of cannon (not Speaker Cannon) if they had the
opportunity. Of these sturdy warriors we have
no criticism. Perhaps for the others, Dallas just
extended too moist a hospitality. On their ar-
rival, it is stated that each mighty vet and de-
fender of the flag was presented with a “ticket
of membership” in a certain “athletic and social
club” (possibly also a literary and Browning
club) which operates and has been operating near
the Fair Grounds, said ticket entitling the holder
to get all the booze he could hold, if he had the
price, at any hour, day or night or Sunday. One
Sunday morning, it is stated, on very good au-
thority, that 2000 bottles of beer were stowed
away beneath cartridge belts, and then, those
who could still keep their feet ambled forth later '
in the day to attend the “sacred concert” given by
the army band.
Perhaps you read in the papers how these
bottle-scarred veterans on the last day of the
great tourney were ordered to break camp and
“hike” and thus become inured to the hardship
of the march, and let the people have a chance
to admire their “fighting men.” The papers said
it was the “heat,” but the mighty vets had hardly
gotten out of the city limits before they began to
“fall out of ranks.” Most of them finally reached
camp in the evening in ambulances and autos,
that had wisely been provided that these first-
class “fighting men” might get up to the fodder
rack again by nightfall. Occasionally, the news-
papers are discovering the troop as it is still
“hiking” back toward dear old San Antone, where
booze will once more be a-plenty and the weary
will have rest.
THE “WILLACY IDEA” AGAIN.
The San Antonio Express in its Sundayrissue
contains a column editorial entitled “Let the Con-
vict Share,” which is the “Willacy Idea” of deal-
ing out humane justice to a lot-of poor devils in
stripes, about 85 per cent of whom are in the
penitentiary, according to a recent report pub-
lished in the Houston Post, because of liquor, di-
rectly or indirectly. The San Antonio Express,
which has always stood as stoutly for the liquor
interests as Senator Willacy himself, thus sets
forth in a paragraph the “Willacy Idea:”
“Universal support should be accorded the
movement among advocates of prison reform that
proposes to allow the deserving convict to share
in the profits which the State derives from his
labor. It is one of the most pregnant suggestions
of the hour respecting a solution of the penal prob-
lems by which Texas is confronted.”
The, Express says the “Willacy Idea” is one
of the “most pregnant suggestions” of the hour.
So it is, for this is progress for you to think at
all of a man after the saloon has stripped him
of all that he has, including his “personal liberty,"
his reputation, his manhood, his home, his wife
and children, and his citizenship. The very fact
that the man is in stripes proves his money had
all gone into the saloon coffers, for no man with
money enough to hire a sharp lawyer need at
present go within prison walls to serve a term.
Perhaps the “Willacy Idea” had its rise in the
Senator’s cogitations that it was now too- late
for him to undo what he has been doing all these
years as lawyer and leader in the Senate and
counselor and adviser in private, of the liquor
forces of Texas. He would have foisted the
saloon on every county and established it in every
city, town, hamlet and cross-roads in the State
had the people not spoken. Even then they have
been hounded by elections. If the “Willacy Idea
No. 1” had had its way in Texas, then the "Wil-
/lacy Idea No. 2” would have had an overflowing
' penitentiary to give back the earnings of its in-
mates to countless liquor-wrecked homes.
Hands off the saloon! cries Willacy and the
Express—don’t even let the people vote to put
them out. When the saloon has robbed a man of
everything that God gave him to enjoy, when with
liquor-inflamed mind his hands have reeked in
the blood of wife, child, or friend, when he is of
no more value to the liquor traffic, when he has
broken the high law of his State and the judge
has assessed the penalty of years or of life impris-
onment and he is turned over to the State for
the people to support for the remainder of life,
while his family lives shunned and dishonored,
with his wife probably ekeing out an existence
at the washtub and his children without food at
times, or proper clothing, then it is that the
Senator from Nueces would step in an obtrude
the “Willacy Idea” as opposed to the prosperous
“Kansas Idea,” and say to the State of Texas,
“all this man earns above his keep ’ henceforth
send to his wife and children. I know that but
for the open saloon he probably would not be
within these walls supported by the taxes of the
people; I further know that to return to his
family that which he earns is but an additional
tax on the people. But what of that—the saloon
is necessary for business reasons. I am for tem-
perance and against prohibition, and I have
always fought for the saloon and the liquor traf-
fic. But I am in favor of giving these poor devils
something back of what they now earn, as long
as it continues to come out of them and out of
the people’s taxes, and the liquor traffic is not out
of pocket anything. Yes, my suggestion is one
of the most pregnant reforms that has ever been
put up to the people of Texas.” Selah!
RAH! FOR CLAY AND CHILDRESS!
On the 4th Clay and Childress counties voted on
whether the saloon business should continue in
their boundaries. When the votes were counted
it was found that each county had gone dry by
a handsome majority. In the report before us,
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Rankin, George C. The Home and State (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 11, No. 15, Ed. 1 Saturday, September 11, 1909, newspaper, September 11, 1909; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1569460/m1/1/?rotate=90: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Texas State Library and Archives Commission.