Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/305

 THE SALOON IN CHICAGO 29 1

sotted beasts gather nightly at the bar," is due to exaggerated pic- tures, drawn by temperance lecturers and evangelists, intended to excite the imagination with a view to arousing public sentiment. I am not charging them with intended falsehood, but with placing in combination things which never so exist in real life ; with blending into one picture hideous incidents taken here and there from the lives of those whom the saloon has wrecked ; with por- traying vividly the dark side of saloon life and calling this picture " the saloon." But it may be asked : " Are they not justi- fied in doing so ? Are not these the legitimate products of the saloon ? By their fruits ye shall know them." Let one step into your orchard, and, gathering into a basket the small, worm- eaten, and half-decayed windfalls return to you saying : " This is the fruit grown in your orchard as the fruit, so is the orchard." The injustice is apparent.

The term " saloon " is too general to admit of concise defini- tion. It is an institution grown up among the people, not only in answer to their demand for its wares, but to their demand for certain necessities and conveniences, which it supplies, either alone or better than any other agency. It is a part of the neigh- borhood, which must change with the neighborhood ; it fulfills in it the social functions which unfortunately have been left to it to exercise. With keen insight into human nature and into the wants of the people, it anticipates all other agencies in supply- ing them, and thus claims its right to existence. In some sections of the city it has the appearance of accomplishing more for the laboring classes from business interests than we from philanthropic motives. The almost complete absence of those things with which the uninitiated are accustomed to associate the drinking of liquor, and the presence of much that is in itself beneficial, often turns them into advocates of the saloon as a social necessity an equally false position.

Hedged in on every side by law, opposed by every contrivance the mind of man could invent, the saloon persists in existing and flourishing " it spreadeth like a green bay tree." The very fact of its persistence ought to cause us to realize that we have not yet struck at the root. The saloon in Chicago is restricted by