The Use and Need of the Life of Carrie A. Nation [125]
medical profession, feel it to be our duty, as
being in some sense the guardians of the public health, to speak plainly
of the nature of alcohol, and of the injury to the individual and the
danger to the community which arise from the prevalent use of intoxicating
liquors as beverages.
We think that it ought to be known that:
1. Experiments have demonstrated that even a small quantity of
alcoholic liquor, either immediately or after a short time, prevents perfect
mental action, and interferes with the functions of the cells and
tissues of the body, impairing self-control by producing other markedly
injurious effects. Hence alcohol must be regarded as a poison, and ought
not to be classed among foods.
2. Observation establishes the fact that a moderate use of alcoholic
liquors, continued over a number of years, produces a gradual deterioriation
of the tissues of the body, and hastens the changes which old age
brings, thus increasing the average liability to disease (especially to
infectious disease,) and shortening the duration of life.
3. Total abstainers, other conditions being similar, can perform more
work, possess greater powers of endurance, have on the average less sickness,
and recover more quickly than non-abstainers, especially from
infectious diseases, while altogether escape diseases specially caused by
alcohol.
4. All the bodily functions of a man, as of every other animal, are
best performed in the absence of alcohol, and any supposed experience
to the contrary is founded on delusion, a result of the action of alcohol
on the nerve centers.
5. Further, alcohol tends to produce in the offspring of drinkers an
unstable nervous system, lowering them mentally, morally and physically.
Thus deterioration of the race threatens us, and this is likely to be greatly
accelerated by the alarming increase of drinking among women, who
have hitherto been little addicted to this vice. Since the mothers of the
coming generation are thus involved the importance and danger of this
increase cannot be exaggerated.
Seeing, then, that the common use of alcoholic beverages is always
and everywhere followed, sooner or later, by moral, physical and social
results of a most serious and threatening character, and that it is the cause,
direct or indirect, of a very large proportion of the poverty, suffering,
vice, crime, lunacy, disease and death, not only in the case of those who
take such beverages, but in the case of others who are unavoidably associated
with them, we feel warranted, nay, compelled to urge the general
adoption of total abstinence from all intoxicating liquors as beverages,
as the surest, simplest, and quickest method of removing the evils which
necessarily result from their use. Such a course is not only universally
safe, but it is also natural.
We believe that such an era of health, happiness and prosperity would
be inaugerated thereby that many of the social problems of the present
age would be solved."
The year has been marked by more detailed examination of the
effects of alcohol upon the human system, with the result that progress
towards its eventual overthrow as a medicine has been distinctly made.
The greatest reforms are brought about quietly, but truth is mighty and
does prevail. It will take time but gradually all will come to feel the
suggestive power in the fact that "The table of nature is spread, and
bountifully spread, for all its millions upon millions of guests, but wine
and strong drink are not on the table."
SCIENTIFIC TESTIMONY ON BEER
(From speech by SENATOR J. H. GALLINGER, M. D., January 9, 1901.)
OPINIONS OF LEADING PHYSICIANS.
The alarming growth of the use of beer among our people, and the
spreading delusion among many who consider themselves temperate and
sober, that the encouragement of beer drinking is an effective way of
promoting
the cause of temperance and of aiding to stamp out the demon rum,
impelled the Toledo Blade to send a representative to a number of the
leading physicians of
being in some sense the guardians of the public health, to speak plainly
of the nature of alcohol, and of the injury to the individual and the
danger to the community which arise from the prevalent use of intoxicating
liquors as beverages.
We think that it ought to be known that:
1. Experiments have demonstrated that even a small quantity of
alcoholic liquor, either immediately or after a short time, prevents perfect
mental action, and interferes with the functions of the cells and
tissues of the body, impairing self-control by producing other markedly
injurious effects. Hence alcohol must be regarded as a poison, and ought
not to be classed among foods.
2. Observation establishes the fact that a moderate use of alcoholic
liquors, continued over a number of years, produces a gradual deterioriation
of the tissues of the body, and hastens the changes which old age
brings, thus increasing the average liability to disease (especially to
infectious disease,) and shortening the duration of life.
3. Total abstainers, other conditions being similar, can perform more
work, possess greater powers of endurance, have on the average less sickness,
and recover more quickly than non-abstainers, especially from
infectious diseases, while altogether escape diseases specially caused by
alcohol.
4. All the bodily functions of a man, as of every other animal, are
best performed in the absence of alcohol, and any supposed experience
to the contrary is founded on delusion, a result of the action of alcohol
on the nerve centers.
5. Further, alcohol tends to produce in the offspring of drinkers an
unstable nervous system, lowering them mentally, morally and physically.
Thus deterioration of the race threatens us, and this is likely to be greatly
accelerated by the alarming increase of drinking among women, who
have hitherto been little addicted to this vice. Since the mothers of the
coming generation are thus involved the importance and danger of this
increase cannot be exaggerated.
Seeing, then, that the common use of alcoholic beverages is always
and everywhere followed, sooner or later, by moral, physical and social
results of a most serious and threatening character, and that it is the cause,
direct or indirect, of a very large proportion of the poverty, suffering,
vice, crime, lunacy, disease and death, not only in the case of those who
take such beverages, but in the case of others who are unavoidably associated
with them, we feel warranted, nay, compelled to urge the general
adoption of total abstinence from all intoxicating liquors as beverages,
as the surest, simplest, and quickest method of removing the evils which
necessarily result from their use. Such a course is not only universally
safe, but it is also natural.
We believe that such an era of health, happiness and prosperity would
be inaugerated thereby that many of the social problems of the present
age would be solved."
The year has been marked by more detailed examination of the
effects of alcohol upon the human system, with the result that progress
towards its eventual overthrow as a medicine has been distinctly made.
The greatest reforms are brought about quietly, but truth is mighty and
does prevail. It will take time but gradually all will come to feel the
suggestive power in the fact that "The table of nature is spread, and
bountifully spread, for all its millions upon millions of guests, but wine
and strong drink are not on the table."
SCIENTIFIC TESTIMONY ON BEER
(From speech by SENATOR J. H. GALLINGER, M. D., January 9, 1901.)
OPINIONS OF LEADING PHYSICIANS.
The alarming growth of the use of beer among our people, and the
spreading delusion among many who consider themselves temperate and
sober, that the encouragement of beer drinking is an effective way of
promoting
the cause of temperance and of aiding to stamp out the demon rum,
impelled the Toledo Blade to send a representative to a number of the
leading physicians of