PERVERTING THE STARS AND STRIPES.
By G.
Nominally the American flag is the emblem of liberty. Wherever it waves permanently, the land is ostensibly “the land of the free.” This is the theory, but practically it never has quite reached the goal. There are various ways in which the original purpose of the Star Spangled Banner has been perverted to ignoble uses; but we will note but one—a very prominent one, namely, the protection of the liquor traffic. Not only in the home land, but wherever the government sets up its authority in other lands, the flag is made to hover over and foster this great evil, which not only enslaves, but robs and beggars and actually kills its thousands of victims every year. The war in the Philippines has been represented as a humanitarian enterprise, a crusade in the interest of freedom for an oppressed people, an opening wedge for the introduction of Christianity. But this specially protected tyrant seems to have been the first to gain a substantial foothold—perhaps because it is more alert and wide awake to embrace the opportunity, and perhaps because it can take root and thrive in “stony ground,” where better principles would fail for lack of nourishment. There are evidences that the Stars and Stripes have been made to guard the gates of this universal curse, and to encourage its prosperity, while the ostensible ultimate purposes of the campaign received less consideration. The theory is that the good results can not be realized until the way for them shall have been cleared by the successful termination of the war. However plausible this theory might be, if possibly correct at all, the liquor traffic has flourished from the start, and bids fair to prosper indefinitely. Writing to Leslie’s Weekly under the heading, “Saloons Sneaking in under the Folds of Old Glory,” Mr. H. Irving Hancock says:— Of all the problems that confront us in the reconstruction of the Philippines the gravest and wickedest is one of our own importation. The Manila saloons, taken collectively, are the worst possible kind of a blot on Uncle Sam’s fair name. The city’s air reeks with the odor of the worst of English liquors. And all this has come to pass since the 13th of August, 1898. With the vanguard of American troops entering Manila, rode the newly appointed Philippine agent of a concern that had shiploads of drink on the way. He secured offices, warehouses, options on desirable locations for saloons, and opened business. Some of the proudest and best youth of the land marched into Manila to proclaim the dawn of a new era of honesty, liberty, and light. It was a day of rare import to the downtrodden East. But the saloon-keeper sneaked in under the folds of Old Glory. Almost by the time the American soldiers had stacked arms in the city, a score of American saloons were open. Swiftly other scores were added to them. The number grew and grew. At the outbreak of the insurrection there were hundreds of American saloons in Manila. To-day there is no thoroughfare of length in Manila that has not its long line of saloons. The street cars carry flaunting advertisements of this brand of whisky and that kind of gin. The local papers derive their main revenue from the displayed advertisements of firms and companies eager for their share of Manila’s drink money. The city presents to the newcomer a Saturnalia of alcoholism. The Filipinos of Manila are rather slow to take to drink. They have always heretofore been an abstemious people. Yet slowly but surely the natives are veering around to the temptations to be found in the saloon. Five years more of the present saloon reign in Manila will see a sad demoralization of the natives. At present the non-drinking majority of the Filipinos feel only contempt for the Americans whom they see lurchingly walking the streets or crouching in silly semi-stupor in the cabs on their way to office, home, or barracks. Bishop Thoburn, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, after a personal visit to the Philippines, testified as follows:— Every alternate place of business seems to be a liquor shop of some kind, and the soldier has temptation before his eyes whichever way he may turn. . . . Drunken soldiers meet me everywhere,9and it is painful in the extreme to remember that many of them have come from Christian homes, and that they have been thrust into the very jaws of temptation, from which only a strong man can be expected to escape. Army Secretary Peyton, of the Brotherhood of St. Andrew, after a six months’ stay in the Philippines, gave this testimony:— At the present time there is no chance for Protestant effort. It is practically useless to undertake to do anything there until the United States troops depart or reform. When the American troops landed in Manila, there was only a saloon or two in the whole place. To-day Manila is a hell-hole. There are 430 or more saloons, typical places of the Western frontier or worse, and the saloons are more respectable than are many of the other places within the city which Americans have either planted or keep alive by their support. Just before I came away from Manila, I had a talk with Senor Publietti. He is almost the only Protestant native there. He was educated in Europe, and is a most devout and intelligent man. He said to me, “So long as this army is here, and it remains such an army as it is, there is not the shadow of a chance for Protestant effort.” And I think Senor Publietti is right. To cap the climax we here adduce some testimony from the liquor traffic itself. The Wine and Spirit News, a journal devoted to the interests of the business, says:— As one result of American occupancy of Manila, the liquor business has reached enterprising proportions, and is now considered as one of the leading, as well as one of the respectable, kinds of business. Says one correspondent: “On the Escolta, the principal street, only a quarter of a mile long, there were but two places where intoxicating liquors were sold when we entered the city, whereas now there are 18. There are 300 licensed places in the city where liquors may be obtained, licenses costing $3 per year. The income of the largest, the Alhambra, is stated on good authority to be $700 per night. Already the street cars are topped with large signs detailing the exquisite qualities of certain whiskies. One-quarter of the daily issue of the principal English newspaper published is devoted to extolling the perfection of a brand of beer, while the largest drug store in town devotes a whole column to advertising its fine line of liquors, with no mention of its medicines.” When the proud banner of the greatest republic on earth to-day can be perverted and prostituted to the protection of so great an evil, what can be said for the prospect of its protecting civil and religious liberty? And when we reflect that professed Protestantism is mainly responsible for the war through which such conditions were brought about (the papal blessing being upon the cause of Spain), it must be conceded that the prospect is still more ominous. To whom, then, shall we look for judgment and righteousness?—“Help, Lord; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.” “Give us help from trouble; for vain is the help of man. Through God we shall do valiantly; for He it is that shall tread down our enemies.” Ps. 12: 1; 108: 12, 13.