Baltimore Evening Sun (27 November 1913): 6.

Balance sheet of the Sunpaper-super-Mahon Christmas tree fund:

Needed for expenses $5,000.00 Collected to date 2,514.09 Amount yet to be collected $2,485.91 Days remaining 28 Amount to be collected each day $88.67 Amount collected yesterday 10.00

A DAILY THOUGHT. Woe unto you, scrrbes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.–Matthew, xxiii, 15.

From an anonymous broadside in the Letter Column:

The following appeared in the Free Lance: “The consumption of alcohol per capita is increasing; the death rate is steadily falling.” [The Hon.] Mr. Mencken concludes that alcohol prolongs life.

Another fine specimen of moral mendacity. Mr. Mencken, in point of fact, concludes nothing of the sort, nor has he ever argued to that effect. All he concludes is that the current rumble-bumble about the fatal effects of moderate quantities of alcohol is as imbecile as the Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte’s argument against the frank and open dealing with the vice problem, and in support of that view he offers to bring forward medical testimony of such positiveness and authority that not even the Hon. William H. Anderson will dare to controvert it.

Judge Gorter’s decision against the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals strikes a blow at that vicious farming out of the police power which has long constituted a public scandal in this community. The way still lies open, true enough, for renewing the city’s contract with the society, but once that contract is open to competitive bidding its essential absurdity will become quickly apparent, and the disposal of homeless and dangerous animals will be vested in the Health Department, where it properly belongs. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is wholly unfit for such work. It is a private and irresponsible organization, and so badly mismanaged that its low comedy spats and hair-pullings are almost constantly in the newspapers. It is an outrage upon orderly government to give such a social club the rights and authority of a city department.

Meanwhile, it is probable that a taxpayers’ suit would also put an end, once and for all time, to the secret and baleful alliance between the Police Board and the Pentz Society. As I have hitherto shown, this society, or its agents, has had complete control of a squad of police, paid by the taxpayers, and has used them in at least one occasion for purposes of private revenge and oppression. The late grand jury, after thoroughly investigating the matter, brought in a report condemning the arrangement, but so far as is known, it has never been abrogated. No need to point out the temptations it offers to fanatical men, working in secret. It must be plain, indeed, that such a devotion of the public police to private uses is wholly out of harmony with our institutions. Whatever useful work the Pentz Society accomplishes might be done just as well by the Police Board itself. And whatever other work it undertakes is no more than private sport for hysterical smuthounds, and hence dangerous to the public security.

The Hon. Dashing Harry to the Honorary Pallbearers:

I wish to call attention to the fact that last May, six months go, I wrote to the members of the House of Representatives and the Senate, calling attention to Senator Ashurst’s bill, which he introduced in the Senate, providing for the establishment of a Federal armor plant.

Advice to the Hon. Bob Crain: Beware of squatters! Let the Hon. Mr. Harry but pipe a tune, and the Honorary Pallbearers let go the silver handles and dance like mad. Ask that other Crane, the Hon. Charles T.

The Federated Charities of Baltimore closed the year ended October 31 with a deficit of $3,938.20. This deficit was incurred in doing useful and construcdtive work–not merely in doling out soup to the poor, but in helping them to their feet and making them self-supporting. Why not wipe part of it out with the money collected for the absurd Christmas tree celebration? In brief, why not pay for our charitable shirts and underwear before burying phony jewelry?

The Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte, LL. D., on a late unpleasantness:

A discreditable report by a discredited grand jury.

Discredited by whom? By the Hon. Mr. Bonaparte, no less! By the Hon. Mr. Bonaparte and his fellow bogus archangels! If the hon. gent. will bring forward one single citizen of Baltimore, not plainly denounced by that report, who has ever uttered a public word against it, I shall be glad to give him a five-cent cigar.

The following resolution, aimed at the Hon. William Jennings Bryan for his services to the Hon. Blair Lee, was railroaded through the annual convention of the Methodist Episcopal Temperance Society the other day by the Hon. William H. Anderson:

Resolved * * * that when officials of the State or national government participate in a State or national campaign the people have a right to expect them to take care that the candidates in whose behalf they intercede * * * shall not be out of harmony with the convictions of the people upon moral issues in that State.

Well, what is the complaint? Wasn’t the Hon. Blair Lee perfectly in “harmony with the convictions fo the people uypon moral issues”–i. e., upon the prohibition issue? Didn’t they decide, by an overwhelming majority, that the campaign of the Anti-Saloon League was a nuisance and its “moral” arguments bumcombe? And wasn’t that opinion just as clearly manifested in the county fights as in the fight over the Hon. Mr. Lee himself?

Certainly, the Hon. Mr. Anderson gets upon shaky ground when he begins to discuss the “convictions of the people.” The convictions of the people were expressed with embarrassing plainness at the late plebiscite. They put an end, once and for all time, to the doctrine that they take their theology from the Hon. Young Cochran and their ethics from the Hon. Mr. Anderson. They proved that they had a great deal more sense than the archangels ever suspected.

Wait for the annual super-bake of the Lord’s Day Alliance! The Hon. Joshua Levering will preside and the Hon. Dashing Harry will lead the “song service.” All the moral behemoths under one tent!

Meanwhile, the Salvarsan Fund has reached $2.82. If all goes well, there will be enough money in hand by January 1 to buy the first dose of salvarsan.–Adv.