happiness and industrial efficiency. This evidence comes from manufacturers, physicians, nurses of all sorts (school, factory, hospital and district), and from social workers of many races and reli gions, laboring daily in a great variety o f fields. This testimony also demonstrates beyond a doubt that Prohibition is actually sapping the terrible forces of disease, poverty, crime and vice. These results are obtained in spite o f the imperfect en forcement in some communities, o f the Eighteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution. . . . Let Massachusetts at once take up her whole share in putting into execution these prohibitory measures which are sure to promote public health, public happiness, and the industrial efficiency throughout the country, and to eliminate the chief causes of poverty, crime, and misery among people. During Prohibition, the post-war years of 1920- 1932 witnessed a decline of 35 to 40 per cent in the general crime rate. What a contrast from the years following World War II! Two hundred and forty hospitals for alcoholic cures were closed down. There were only about a dozen left in the whole country; they were not needed any longer. This was a period of unprecedented prosperity and the na tional debt was reduced from $25 billion to $16 bil lion. Despite weaknesses and abuses o f the 18th Amendment, its influence as a whole was not a fail ure but a glowing success. It is the judgment o f many careful students of history that this amendment was maliciously sabo taged. Two full-length books that should be read are Wrecking of the 18th Amendment by Gordon and The Amazing Story of Repeal. T he P hysical H arm of A lcohol It is today the No. 3 health problem, following closely behind heart trouble and cancer. Think of the physical harm of automobile accidents. It is commonly understood today that 50 per cent of the fatal accidents involve beverage alcohol. The war in Viet Nam, from 1960 to 1965, took the lives of 1,071 people. But do you know how many lives are lost in automobile accidents involving alcohol ? There were 108,929 fatalities! More than 100 times as many! Viet Nam is terrible, but why don’t we get so con cerned about something that is so needless? There are other physical complications, including sclerosis of the liver caused by drinking, but the greatest tragedy in America is alcoholism. Alcoholism is increasing by leaps and bounds. It formerly was just the men, but it now includes women and young people. Let me assure you that
“moderate drinking” is no guarantee against alco holism. Moderate drinking CAUSES alcoholism. It leads so very naturally to it. No doubt there are other contributing factors to alcoholism than alco hol, but without alcohol there would be no alcohol ism ! Just as in the case of tuberculosis, there would be no such disease in the body without the intro duction of the tuberculosis bacilli, so there would be no alcoholism without the introduction of alco hol into the human organism. Every pastor can relate many heart-rendering illustrations o f the awfulness of this terrible thing. It is more than sickness. It is sin! It is a sickness that is brought on by sin. Three situations come to my mind, out of many. There was the older man on skid row in Chicago whom I befriended, fed at times and gave clothing to. He had been successful, had a lovely family, but under the influence of alcoholism became so de graded that in filth and rags he would curl up be hind a garbage can and sleep at night, or in a park. Another man in the prime o f life holding a good job, a fine family, and owning good property, lost his house, his job and almost his family. He came to me in terror after drinking for three months, not being able to stop. Another was a young man, 21, who had been in my confirmation class and now was discovered to be a hopeless alcoholic. His parents were respectable people, but he had obtained his drinks from the family refrigerator at a very young age. The best cure for alcoholism is prevention. The best prevention is total abstinence. Really, alco holism is incurable once it has fastened itself upon one in its tenacity. One can never drink another drop without being caught away by it again. Re member, only one out of ten or eleven alcoholics is ever rehabilitated to a sober life again. What right does anyone have to endanger, need lessly, the lives of others on the streets and high ways o f our land? Even one or two drinks of beer can distort one’s judgment and coordination so seriously that he becomes a hazard behind the wheel. Crime, gambling and alcoholic beverages cost the citizens of our country 60 billion dollars a year. No doubt alcohol is an encouragement to crime, gambling and immorality of other kinds. What a drain on our economy! T he E conomic F olly We formerly heard of the great tax relief the sale of alcohol would be to our country. This was prom ised and assured us before repeal, but it just has
FEBRUARY, 1968
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