Old Missoula

Reverend John N. Maclean versus Clarence Darrow

The Anti-Saloon League Battles the Montana Commercial and Labor League (Dry versus Wet) – The Prohibition Controversy – 1916

The famous attorney Clarence Darrow visited Missoula in October of 1916, prior to the election in November. He was there for one purpose – to persuade Missoula voters to vote against the Prohibition bill. He came at the behest of representatives of The Montana Commercial and Labor League, which represented the liquor industry. Even then Darrow was acknowledged as one of the nation’s great attorneys. Later he would make history in the John T. Scopes Monkey Trial. In 1916 Darrow barnstormed all over Montana, campaigning against the prohibitionist movement while allegedly being paid a lot of money for his trouble. A Missoulian editor wrote on Nov. 2, 1916 that Darrow’s fee was $4,200 for giving 14 speeches throughout the state. His backers no doubt thought the money was well spent.

The city of Butte even gave Darrow a grand parade the night before the November election and he subsequently spoke to a packed audience at the Broadway Theater. Hundreds of people couldn’t get in. He was introduced by the president of the Montana State Federation of Labor, an organization endeared to him. Darrow spoke there 4 years earlier, lecturing on “The Industrial Conspiracy” and came billed as the “greatest orator in America Today.” No better advocate could be found to persuade Montana citizens that Prohibition was a travesty.

But even this powerful speaker couldn’t sway a majority of the citizens of Montana to vote against prohibition. Although the controversy had been brewing a long time, Montana citizens were hearing convincing arguments from the other side of that issue now more than ever. Officials of the Anti-Saloon League used classic examples of lives destroyed by alcohol and its effects, including gambling, prostitution and assorted crimes associated with antisocial behavior. They also used evidence of a scientific nature, introducing facts and figures demonstrating the deleterious effects of alcohol on one’s physical wellbeing.

In his comprehensive Master’s Thesis in 1984, Louis J. Bahin, cited the effective campaign waged by the Prohibition movement in Montana[1]: “The Anti-Saloon League used statistical evidence linking saloons with crimes and disease to support economic arguments in favor of Prohibition. Drys calculated the cost of saloons to society based on the number of crimes committed by saloon patrons.”

A theme of Bahin’s thesis was effect of the Progressive movement in Eastern Montana during the early part of the century. “Progressives encouraged the acceptance of industrial values such as scientific management and efficiency while also defending traditional symbols of social stability. Prohibition legislation offered one way in which both of these goals could be fulfilled.” Eastern Montana citizens voted heavily for Prohibition in 1916.

One of the most forceful local voices to take up the mantel against Darrow’s argument was Reverend John Maclean of the Presbyterian Church in Missoula. He was the father of Missoula’s most famous writer, Norman Maclean. He did it via a letter to the Missoulian printed on November 2, 1916. It forcefully undercut Darrow’s theory that demon “Rum” couldn’t be the cause of crime or poverty. He used facts and statistics to make his point. It’s an interesting and logically presented piece of writing. Given the controversial climate, it must have taken some courage to write it. Social life in Montana was soon to change.

Darrow’s attack on Montana prohibition backers was unsuccessful. Montana voters passed a state prohibition law in November 1916 by a large margin, and the state went officially dry, beginning January 1 of 1919. Figures released to the Secretary of State after the election in 1916 showed that the wet backers spent almost $70,000 on their losing campaign.

 

Below is a Daily Missoulian article detailing Clarence Darrow’s anti-prohibition speech in Missoula, given October 30, 1916. Following this is a letter to the newspaper written by the Reverend John Maclean of Missoula’s Presbyterian church.

 

DARROW IS RECEIVED BY IMMENSE CROWD

Missoula Theater Is Packed to Hear Famous Attorney Flay Prohibition

Those who went to the Missoula theater last evening expecting to hear Clarence S. Darrow of Chicago rip prohibition up the back and drive home his arguments with convincing facts and figures were probably disappointed in the address this eminent attorney, best known for his fight for labor, gave against prohibition. However, Mr. Darrow made a good talk, probably the best that has been heard here on either side of the prohibition question. Once the name of Charles E. Hughes[2], presidential candidate, was mentioned. There was a long and enthusiastic demonstration.

Mr. Darrow did drive home some of his points with logical arguments, viewed from the side of the anti-prohibitionists. However, he did not deal with figures or comparative scores in the prohibition league nor did he turn the spotlight of the anti-prohibitionist on “bleeding Kansas.”[3] Rather his talk was satirical throughout and his audience – the largest which has turned out to hear any campaign speaker in Missoula this year – was in an uproar practically all the time. One or two peculiar-sounding laughs in the gallery added to the general merriment of the crowd.

Mr. Darrow did not storm, nor did he thunder. He simply talked and friends and foe leaving the theater declared his talk to be a good one, entertaining, full of logic, for his side, at least, clean and straight forward throughout.

D. B. Flammer, general organizer for the Cooper’s International union, presided at the meeting and introduced Mr. Darrow with a short talk.

The Drys’ Arguments.

The three arguments put up by the Prohibitionists, Mr. Darrow said, are that “rum” is responsible for the crime in the world, for the poverty, and fills the jails and drunkards’ graves. It was on these three things that he centered his wit, satire and argumentative attack.

Opening his address Mr. Darrow said you could keep men sober by locking up all the all the alcohol, or locking up all the men. However, he said that would not make men or change human nature. Then he made a short plea for personal liberty.

“Rum has practically nothing to do with crime,” declared Mr. Darrow. “Crimes are murder, robbery, burglary, larceny and getting money under false pretenses. Getting drunk is no crime, it is an error of judgement.” Nine tenths of all crime is property crime, he said. The poor fill the jails, but the poor are not the only ones who drink. The poor do not have property and those with property are not in jail, he added.

High Price of Food.

The high price of food, Mr. Darrow said, was responsible for more crime than rum has ever been responsible for. He summed up his argument by declaring that not booze, but social conditions were responsible for poverty. He advocated reform in dealing with criminals. “Cure poverty, cure crime,” was the way he ended this phase of his talk.

Poverty was next taken up and the speaker said that overeating, overdressing by workingmen’s wives and indulgence in luxury causes poverty. “Rum,” he said, “has no more to do with the general cause of poverty than a change of the moon. Some even give too much to the church.”

If prohibition made people rich, Mr. Darrow argued, all Prohibitionists would be wealthy. They are not, he added. He also argued that people can’t be made rich by law. He pointed out that the poor did not do all the drinking, but that rich often drink. This he said showed the fallacy of this part of the argument of the Prohibitionists. He urged temperance in all things, but declared that things, not necessaries of life, were purchased by all because we all want a few luxuries.

“We all want anything to help take away the monotony or drudgery of life and the poor man can afford some of it.”

Standard of Living.

Mr. Darrow pointed out that labor’s wages is fixed largely by the standard of living and here, dealing with the labor question, he broke into the best part of his talk. His advice to labor was not to give up anything as it has been too hard to get and labor should now get more. He dealt at length with the question of capitol and labor and their relation to “rum.” Both use liquor, he said.

“You can’t abolish poverty until you abolish monopoly,” summed up the speaker.

“If part of the money and half the talk wasted each year by the Prohibitionists were used in fighting tuberculosis that dread disease could be wiped off of the globe,” declared Mr. Darrow in connection with his argument that “rum” does not fill all the graves. He said some died of drinking too much, but declared for every drunkard’s death there were 10 deaths among people who overeat. He declared the prohibitionists do not care about how many people die, but how they die. If they find a man dies from drinking they are astounded, because, he said, “rum” is their business. He said the working man lives only about one-third as long as people who work with their brains. He went into this phase at some length.

Moral Legislation Not Needed.

“We don’t need legislation on morals to make the workingman’s life longer,” he said, “give us good working conditions for the workingman and he will take care of his morals.”

He said the Prohibitionists associated the saloon and beer with pleasure and that they hold anything joyful to be sinful. He said they lived only for the next life after they had left the earth. The speaker advocated living here on this earth so as to get the most happiness out of life and let the after life take care of itself.

“Leave men work out their instincts. Let them develop character and be free because there is no greater happiness than freedom. The human race is going on and on to a greater freedom and a greater, better land of liberty,” Mr. Darrow concluded.

All the saloons in town were closed during the time of Mr. Darrow’s talk.

 

The above article appeared in The Daily Missoulian on October 31, 1916.

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Reverend John Maclean’s Letter – Missoulian 11/2/1916

Editor Missoulian:

Mr. Darrow of Chicago is a great entertainer and played that role well at the anti-prohibition meeting in the Missoula theater on Monday evening, last. According to your report, “His talk was satirical throughout, and his audience was practically in an uproar all the time.” Satire can afford to be disdainful of truth and reason, and a laughing crowd may easily forget to think. Mr. Darrow is a brilliant man, and has a genius for making the worse appear the better reason. Now that the magic of his words and the magnetism of his personality have cooled down, let us sit in somber judgement on his so called “logical arguments.” Are they based on facts, or are they such stuff as dreams are made of?

He presented his plea for the liquor business in the form of an argument. According to your report, which I take to be correct, he based his discussion on three main propositions. If these propositions are true, the arguments, however brilliantly conceived and constructed, are misleading and fallacious.

His first proposition was that “Rum – which means intoxicating liquors – has practically nothing to do with crime,” that nine-tenths of all crime is due to poverty.

There is no doubt that poverty has a casual relation to crime, but that it is “the cause of nine-tenths of all crime” is a reckless exaggeration.

There is just enough truth in the statement to make it easy of perversion, and Mr. Darrow took the easy way with it. On the other hand, to say that “rum has practically nothing to do with crime,” is to contradict the facts of everyday experience and observation, the court records of every civilized country in the world, and the findings of social investigators everywhere. The great majority of the people listening to Mr. Darrow knew, as all intelligent people do, form their own personal observation and reading that “Rum” is the greatest single cause of crime operating in our city and state at any rate. It may be different in Chicago, but it is so here in Missoula and Montana. The court records show that beyond peradventure.

The daily press reports of crimes and misdemeanors committed in our own city make the fact familiar to every man, woman and child who read them. The fact that the penitentiary population of Colorado has decreased 111 in the first six months of the “Dry” regime is proof that “booze” and crime go together as cause and effect. Suicides and murders have decreased in Washington one half since that state went dry, is 5,844 (sic). The Massachusetts editor of the Seattle Daily Times, a former opponent of prohibition, “the total human beings kept out of jail, apparently by the operation of the prohibition law,” since Washington went dry, is 5,44 (sic). The Massachusetts Bureau of Labor made an investigation in Suffolk county, which includes the city of Boston, and gives us these facts: The total number of sentences passed during the year for which the investigation was made was 16,897. Of these 12,289, or 72 per cent, were “rum offenses,” including both these chargeable to drunkenness and to illegal sales, by far the larger number to drunkenness. In addition, 2,097 other crimes were committed by men under the influence of liquor and in which it was a contributing cause. So that the total summary charged up to “Rum” is 14,368, or 84 per cent of all the crimes of Boston for that year. What is true of Missoula and Colorado and Washington and Boston is true everywhere.

To say that “Rum has practically nothing to do with crime” is to say a very funny thing, if it were not intended to be deceptive. It may be that Mr. Darrow’s side-splitting, uproarious humor takes the form of ridiculous fiction. That is one style of humor, but it is hardly in place in the discussion of a great question on which the voters of this state are to pronounce next Tuesday in the ballot box.

The second proposition on which Mr. Darrow based his discussion was to the effect that “Rum” is not responsible for the world’s poverty.

Of course we understand that Mr. Darrow has an economic explanation of the world’s poverty that covers all its manifestations. I am not going to discuss his theory of wealth and poverty. What I am interested in, so far as this discussion is concerned, is the condition of poverty as it comes before us day by day. To meet the implications of Mr. Darrow’s argument one would have to come to an understanding with him regarding the meaning of the word “Poverty.” As I regard it, one is not necessarily in poverty because he is a laboring man, or a wage-earner, or a salaried man, nor because he owns no bank stock, railroad or government bonds nor lands, no mines, nor ranks as a capitalist. By poverty I mean a condition of life in which there is not sufficient food and proper clothing and home comforts, and where educational privileges do not obtain and are not obtainable. That is poverty, and nothing else is.

To say that “Rum” does not cause poverty is to deny the facts of our own everyday observation and experience and the testimony of social workers and students of social conditions everywhere. The poverty of the drunkard and of the drunkard’s home is so obtrusive and general that only one conclusion is possible. The most moderate estimate of the causes of real poverty charges directly to “Rum” 50 per cent of it. But its direct contribution to poverty is only a part of it. Wasted efficiency, moral deterioration, ill health, shortened life, and all that kind of thing, chargeable indirectly, if not directly, to “Rum,” go to swell the ranks of the pitiably poor and incompetent and destitute. To deny that is to deny facts too plain for denial unless the denial is made by a humorist.

The third proposition on which Mr. Darrow based his arguments was to the effect that “Rum” does not shorten life, that is, that it is not physically injurious, and that it raises no question of moral well-being.

While he was speaking he had practically every bartender in Missoula before him, but he neglected to tell them that as a class they are the shortest lived of any class or calling in modern life, excepting deep sea divers, and one or two other extremely hazardous occupations. It is made clear in these days that alcohol, the active principle in every intoxicating liquor, is a poison and weakens resistance to disease, and is itself a disease producer. No one says that “Rum” fills all the graves, and Mr. Darrow didn’t need to deny that; but it is a fact that the use of alcohol destroys health and shortens life, and is therefore a great menace to public health. Mr. Darrow said that “if part of the money and half the talk wasted each year by the prohibitionists were used in fighting tuberculosis, [it would be] wiped off the globe.” I wonder if he knows that alcohol is one of the most pernicious favorers of tuberculosis in all the world. “In view of the close connection between alcoholism and tuberculosis,” reads a resolution of the International Congress on Tuberculosis, “this congress strongly emphasizes the importance of combining the fight against tuberculosis with the struggle against alcohol.” Brouardel, a French authority, calls alcohol “the most powerful factor in the propagation of tuberculosis.” It seems as if the prohibitionists are in the most efficient way fighting “the great white plague” when they are fighting the great white poison.

Anyone who is acquainted with Mr. Darrow’s way of thinking knows that moral considerations have little weight with him. “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die,” is his philosophy of life. With us, however, we believe, with the great majority of the men and women of Missoula and Montana, it matters a great deal whether the liquor business tends to degrade and vitiate and destroy character or not. We believe that both for the life that now is and for that which is to come, character should be saved against all its enemies, and of them none is more destructive and wasteful and cruel than the liquor business. Therefore we believe it should be destroyed, and will be destroyed if not now, when the people are wiser than they are now.

J. N. MACLEAN.

Missoula, Montana, November 1, 1916.

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