It was a crisis in prohibition enforcement in Kansas. The first
smashing was like the opening of a battle. The crashing glass sent a
thrill through the community and resounded o'er the land a talisman of
destruction to the liquor traffic. It set everybody to talking, even the
public school children and students in all the higher institutions were
profoundly interested. The press and the pulpit broke their silence and from
all over the state came the echo. It was the firing of the signal guns.
The response came desultory, as the rattle of musketry in a skirmish,
then heavier from the bigger guns, as is the case in all reformatory work.
The criticisms and comments were varied, often amusing, reflecting the
agitation from far and near and everywhere.
A few months ago and the name of Mrs. Nation was unknown outside
of Medicine Lodge, Kansas, but within the limits of sixty days she has
achieved notoriety, if not fame, by her unique crusade against the
Kansas saloon. Many methods have been adopted during the last two
decades for the abatement of the liquor nuisance, but it remained for an
American woman, under the spur of bitter memories, and a sort heart, to
originate a method, at once so bold and radical as to sharply focus
public attention upon the utter villainy and lawlessness of the Kansas
saloon.
As was to be expected, Mrs. Nation has been subjected to
unhandsome treatment. A section of the press and the pulpit have joined
forces with the rum brigade in holding her up to ridicule. She has been
burlesqued, abused and belied; but when all the facts are soberly and
fairly weighed, it will be found that the scale of justice inclines,
very positively,
toward this sorely tried woman and her hatchet. I do not pose
as Mrs. Nation's champion or apologist; she needs neither. History
that corrects the blunders of contemporary critics, will assign to her an
honored place long after the paltry penny-a-liner and ranting pulpiteer
are forgotten. It is a simple task for those to whom the curse of rum
has never come close home, to condemn the methods of a woman, who,
as a drunkard's wife and widow, drank to the dregs the bitter cup of woe.
Mrs. Nation saw her brilliant and handsome young husband slowly transformed
into a demon by rum. She saw him land in an early and dishonored
grave. She saw her baby cursed by the father's sin. She saw
her early hopes blighted, and poverty haunting her door. She saw a
favorite sister grieving her heart out over a fallen husband—fallen in
purse, in character, and station. With this black catalogue of domestic
griefs "deep printed on her heart," is there a man—surely there is no
woman!—who could blame Mrs. Nation, if she turned upon the guilty
gang who had blighted her life and smote them right and left. When
the infernal record of rum is recalled, it is not so surprising that there
is one Mrs. Nation, but that there is not one in every home in the United
States.
M. N. BUTLER.
