Local Option Laws in the South
By Independent
Two more Southern States have local option laws—Virginia and Mississippi. The Mississippi law is a stringent one. In its general features it resembles the Georgia law, providing for elections by counties and preserving the present restrictions concerning license. If a county votes for liquor, no license can issue in any town or municipality, except upon petition signed by twenty-five free-holders. This petition must lie over for thirty days, and if in the meantime a counter-petition, signed by a majority of the legal voters of such town or municipality, is presented, license cannot be granted. This gives the friends of temperance a mighty grip on the liquor fiend, and it will go hard with them if they do not cut short his existence in Mississippi.—Independent.