"BLUE LAWS" IN U.S.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17732, 7 April 1923, Page 10

"BLUE LAWS" IN U.S.

"DRIVE" AGAINST SMOKERS. (FROM OUR OWJf COBBESPONDEKT.) SAN FRANCISCO, March 16. The campaign initiated in the State of Utah to prevent the sale of tobacco, cigars, and cigarettes and their consumption in that section of the United States, coupled with the arrest of four freeborn white Americans, all of adult ages, has brought Salt Lake City into tho limelight once more, and, furthermore, has tended to bring down a chorus of severe criticism, upon the State from all parts of America. In addition to the arrest of these four prominent citizens of Salt Lalco there have been scores of apprehensions in Salt Lake City of persons for the "crime"'of buying and selling cigarettes. Friends of the accused made light of the charges, one man in Washington, D.C., sending a telegram asking, "Why don't you move to the United States?" Disinterested persons comment that unfortunately Utah is in the United States, and moreover there is another State with similar laws. The fact is that all over the United States there is a reign of restrictive legislation, and what was once the land of the free is now the land from which personal liberty is being rapidly banished, says one writer in the West. This same observer adds: "Thepeople of America have permitted themselves to be robbed of the freedom for which their forefathers fought and died. Bond slavery is forbidden, but the whip of Simon Legree has been put into the hands of the lawmakers, and the lash' of their legislation is flicking the whole American people on the raw. The cranks are in the saddle, and they are digging their spurs into the democracy. No tyranny of the ancient despots was more irritating than the present tyranny of faddists that want to compel everybody to act as they think everybody ought to act. Tho prejudices and personal preferences of the organised few are being embodied in laws imposed upon the disorganised majority." Absurd Legislation. It Is generally recalled that in the dawn of the Bepublic there was organisation for liberty, but now most of the organisation is fot the purpose of destroying that liberty. Most of the newspapers all over the United States have severely denounced the impasse in Utah, and the San Francisco "Bulletin" Bays: "We have permitted freedom to defeat its purpose since we have given' cranks the freedom to write whatever laws they please. The United States grew to greatness under a personal 'liberty that attracted tho best spirits from all parts of the world and that encouraged initiative and enterprise. We became great, not because of our boundless natural resources, but because of the liberty to develop them. Our heritage is the richest in the world, but it was won from the soil by a free people. Can it be retained if we are to, be no longer free? Will not the habit of interfering with personal liberty in personal matters undermine the spirit that raised three million people on a small strip of the Atlantic seaboard to more than a hundred million stretching from the Atlantio to the Pacific. "It is not a crime to smoke tobacco. No man ever committed murder with a pipo or a cigar in his mouth. We taught, the world to smoke, and though the subject is beyond the reach of statistics it is a conservative estimate to sav that more comfort, consolation, 1 and peace of mind have come to the human raoe through the use of tobacco than from any other material source, i "The people of Utah are not to fce blamed for this gross outrage oa the right* of American citiaens* They probably &ro as human as the peoplo of the rest of the United States. But, as in many other States and over the nation as a whole, they have allowed the nuts and cranks, the _ compact t minority, to override the majority. If a man may not snioko ill & public place he is about as free M a slave. If he may not blow the cool tobacco smoke cloud without running the risk of being arrested, the next thing he will find himself regulated in the matter of Mb diet, and forbidden to oat onions or beefsteak or any other thing offensive to a bloc of reformers. From forbidding tobacco it ia only » step to forbidding coffee, tea, ana spices—(i step' that will bfi taken unless the democracy awakfes to the menace of the creeping paralysis of personal legislation that is now threatening it." Curfew Law Next. There is every prospect of the State of Utah becoming almost shortly, judging oy the manner m which the freak legislators intend' to impose ©von. more drastic lawo in that Western region of benighted America. In announcing the ushering of enforcement week" in Salt Lake County, the Social Welfare League of Salt Lake City stated that the officials of thatt body were, determined to secure a more rigid enforcement of all kiwß. _ Th© League endorsed the present ette law, and lauded Sheriff Harries for his raiding of prominent cafes and aiv

resting of leading cU»eos fOT iolationS of the Statute. which th« Social Among the l«to prom . Welfai-e league g wec k were mence during tne the di ftnces declaring tie dance hail ntent ' un til the oXTlnws «e re rigidly enforced in th Wlalo'Thc League was busy fordr* , . ~noil ;Ul unwelcome public, the greatest, public demonstrations ever staged by .wg* like"atT* At aS no l on on the opening Jin nfte ' ''bluo" law campaign, whistfi in a hundred factories chorused' a Stest against freak legislation At 1% Slock several thousand protestante, including de legations from Hineham. and other towns up to ftft> miles distant, crowded into a the;itn , where prominent speakers urged fo "™£ Ln of a freeman's league to fig t> frcik legislation and seek repeal of tlu anti-cigarette law. Predictions were foely made that unless some immediate relief wore given from the oppresLn of such laws aiidtheadveraopublicity attracted to Ijtah by reason o« their existence, the ancient oonflict teforecn Mormon and non-Mormon residents of the State, winch has lam dormailt for more than a d cade, would he revived in all its vigour. Republican County Committeemen have announced an intention to investigate the secret pledge given by Chairman Loofbourow to the anti-cigarette foroes for the Salo Lake County legislators, m whicil it was promised to keep hands off in BOy attempt to make a change in the existing law. Opposition to the measure grew to a remarkable degree, JUKI indignation waa expressed.'owing to many tourists refusing to visit Salt Lnk« Oity, thereby causing a loss financially to hotels, restaurants, and other Unea of business which depend to a large extent upon patronage of travellers across the American continent. Many restaurant owners have posted signs in their establishments to remind mtrons of the anti-cigarette l aw - *** is pointed out that this Statu to dO6B not ban smoking in places designated afl "public amoiking rooms," and m wcrg« W. Morgan's cafe, where four, or Jsal® Lake City's most prominent citizens were arreted while having tlteir after-1 dinner smoke, a sign was posted that Morgan's establishment was open to the public for smoking purposes. Morgan stated that he had conferred! withi the City Attorney (Publio Prosecutor), «n on the advice of that official he had ohanged the status of his restaurant. Subsequently the Freeman's. League of Utah was launched with the express purpose of repealing all so-called Utah blue laws. Thousands of members were enrolled daily into the new organise tion. The anti-cigarette law iras passed two years ago, but it was not until the lhst •week of February that it was put into force. Very few believe that many months will elapse ere it is repealed. in the face of the strong public' opinion that opposes Hudh freak legislation.