Autobiography of Charles Clinton Nourse / Prepared for use of Members of the Family

by Charles Clinton Nourse

The house spent the day yesterday on the prohibition bill. Our report in detail shows how desperately the democrats are fighting the inevitable.

The spectacle of the democrats voting at one time yesterday, for dishonest purposes, for absolute prohibition, and next ranging themselves on the side of the low license or practically no temperance law at all, is a vivid illustration of the insincerity of that party on the temperance question. Their attitude is insincerity itself, and they are ready to do anything to defeat honest temperance measures. The only test vote had yesterday was on the Bolter absolute prohibition bill (amendment) which was defeated by forty-nine yeas to fifty nays; all the democrats and all the greenbackers and one republican, Mr. Schee, voting for the amendment. Fifty republicans voted in the negative.

During the pendency of the discussion the Register of the same date contains a report of the speeches of Governor Carpenter and Mr. Kerr in favor of the bill. The following is the full text of Mr. Kerr's speech as reported in the Register of February 28, 1884. Mr. Kerr said:

The opponents of the bill were wonderfully afraid it would not prohibit. There had never been any question as to the constitutionality of the amendment passed in 1882. It was only the manner of its enactment by the nineteenth general assembly that had rendered it invalid. He agreed with Mr. Dabney that the manufacture of liquors for any purpose was wrong. What was it the people of the state wanted to prohibit? The saloons; those hot-beds of infamy that were constantly bringing disgrace upon the state and misery upon the people. Any representative who fails to crystallize into form of law the will of the people fails to do his duty. How are we to know this sentiment, if not by the votes of the people? There is no better way. Mr. Bolter was eloquent in his denunciations of the evils of intoxication and he agreed with that gentleman and hoped when the time came the man from Harrison would vote in accordance with that sentiment. There are no interests in the state, vested or otherwise, that are higher than the interests of the whole people of the state, and it was better for a few to lose a few dollars than to entail and fasten upon the state an industry that directly or indirectly injures every man in it. It is best for all to have the business wiped out. Mr. Merrill asked Mr. Kerr if the bill permitted the manufacture of liquors for export. Mr. Kerr replied that the bill had been prepared by its friends and it was not intended to have it loaded down by its enemies. The intention of the law was not to prohibit the manufacture for exportation, as there were some doubts as to whether that could be done.

This law as it passed the house was published in full in the Register of the 28th of February, and on the 29th of February we have this leading editorial in the same paper:

The Iowa City Press tries to prove the impossible thing that the proposed prohibitory law in Iowa will discriminate against Iowa brewers and in favor of Iowa distillers. The same stale cry of the democratic campaign. We have heretofore shown that the proposed interdiction treats distillery and brewery alike and leaves both free to manufacture for export.

As to the vineyards of Johnson and other Iowa counties, their products ought to be able to ship as far and sell as well as the product of the Iowa distillers, and it will do so if it is a good article; if it is not a good article it will find no buyer at home now or abroad hereafter.

I have quoted the above remarks of Mr. Kerr, for the reason that Mr. Kerr was one of the most staunch and extreme prohibitionists on that he was in favor of absolute prohibition; but at the same time he distinctly repudiates the idea that the legislation which he was then advocating was intended to accomplish any such end. The state temperance convention had simply demanded of the legislature that the will of the people of Iowa as expressed in the vote upon the constitutional amendment should be embodied in a law of the state. Or as Mr. Kerr very significantly remarks, should be "crystallized into law." It is well known as a part of the history of this temperance movement that the Iowa State Register, the leading journal of the state that advocated the constitutional amendment, demanded of the nineteenth general assembly, as one of the conditions upon which it would support the amendment, that it should adopt a joint resolution defining the meaning and intent of that proposed amendment, and that it should declare that it was not intended to prevent the manufacture of intoxicating liquors for the purpose of export and sale beyond the state boundaries. That resolution, with the vote by which it was adopted, is on page 501 of the senate journal, 1882, and is as follows:

Whereas, doubts have been suggested as to the true intent and meaning of the joint resolution proposing to amend the constitution of this state, etc.; therefore be it

Resolved by the senate, that said proposed amendment was and is designed and intended to prohibit the manufacture within this state for sale within this state as a beverage, of all intoxicating liquors, including ale, wine and beer, and to prohibit the selling of such liquors within this state for use as a beverage, and prohibit the keeping of such liquors, for sale as a beverage within this state; and was not designed to prohibit the manufacture, sale or keeping for sale of such liquors for any or all other purposes.