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THE KANSAS SALOON WAR

A Particularly Awkward State of Things in Wichita

New York Sun

Topeka, July 27 – the long threatened war between the liquor interests and the anti-saloon forces in this State is now on, and promises to be a fight to the finish. During the Lewelling administration saloons were allowed to get a strong hold in all the larger towns and cities, where they were fined regularly every month, which acted as a license. They occupied the best localities, and the furnishings were of the best and most permanent character. In Wichita, besides the sixty saloons, several of the largest breweries and wholesale liquor houses established agents and distributing depots, and the supplies were sent to these establishments by the car load. Wichita, Atchiton and Leavenworth were never without their drinking places for the length of an entire day since the adoption of the Prohibition amendment to the Constitution in 1880, but during the administrations previous to Lewelling they were hid away in basements and on upper floors, and were to be classed as “joints” rather than saloons, although the infractions of the prohibitory law were as frequent and pronounced as though they had been operated as open saloons.

Soon after the inauguration of Governor Morrill in January the enemies of the open saloon began an energetic agitation which finally forced the Governor to declare himself, which he did by announcing through the press that it was his conviction that in communities where the public sentiment was strongly opposed to the prohibitory law it was impossible for the law with any degree of satisfaction. This was taken by the saloon men as the keynote of the new administration, and the wholesale houses in Wichita doubled their stocks and prepared to open saloons in all the larger towns in that part of the State. The governor was known to be a good church deacon and personally opposed to the saloon, and this declaration brought on a sudden crises. The liquor men took courage as they had never done before, while their opponents raised such an alarm as brought representative people from all parts of the State to this city on the Fourth of July, and at a mass convention then held they devised for a campaign which would defeat Governor Morrill in the convention next year when he asks for a renomination.

Suddenly the Governor instructed his Attorney General to close up the saloons and joints in all the counties where there were no cities of the first class, and to the police commissioners in these cities he sent word to close immediately all drinking places of every sort or kind, except in Leavenworth. The Governor, is the president of the First National Bank of Leavenworth, and the Wichita dealers declared that there was some sort of an understanding between the saloon men in Leavenworth and the chief executive, and they denounced the law officers for their partiality in closing the saloons in one city and allowing them to run in another. The Governor declares that he will close them in Wichita first and then he will have time to attend to the others.

But the Wichita dealers are up in arms and have declared relentless war on any and all officials, from the Governor down. The first move was for the city council to declare that with the revenues from the saloon cut off, they would not be able to run the city government and they discharged on of the best fire companies in the city. This was followed by a notice to the police commissioners that there was no money with which to pay the salaries of the police department and that after today the officers could either quit or work without pay. The liquor men were not idle and their friends worked up all the sentiment possible in favor of some sort of a compromise that would allow the saloons to continue to pay their regular monthly fines into the city treasury, so that the various departments of the city might run along the usual

The Attorney General had just appointed the Assistant Attorney General for Wichita, and he today declared to the correspondent of the Sun that the law would be enforced in Wichita if it required every dollar in the State treasury and every man in the Kansas National Guard. At a special meeting of the city council a few days ago all the ordinance for the regulation and control of saloons and joints were repealed with a rush, the intention being to leave the police department without any law under which to deal with such offenders. The police judge of Wichita was in this city last night, and to the Sun correspondent said that he would continue to deal with the offenders under an old ordinance which the council had overlooked, which was made and provided for the cowboy days, and which deals with the drinkers instead of the sellers of liquor. It is believed, however, that a special meeting of the council will be held very soon for the repeal of this, the last law under which the police can operate.

The Wichita rebellion incident is the uppermost theme in all parts of the State, and the people are somewhat divided although there are numerous friends of the saloons who declare that if the dealers could have been satisfied with a moderate infraction of the law they would not have brought on all this trouble, but that they were determined to capture the entire State instead of a few of the larger towns. It is now quite probable that the end of the “war” will be the utter annihilation of the liquor interests in Kansas and the strengthening of the present law by the next Legislature, so that the saloon men will not be able to secure another foothold in the State. There is not disguising the fact that the prohibition element is gaining friends among certain classes that have heretofore been indifferent in the matter, but that are for the enforcement of the law, especially when the lawbreakers become so bold and defiant. (The State, August 2, 1895)