TO DRINK OR NOT TO DRINK
To drink or not to drink? That was the question which was literally and figuratively on the minds, lips, and tongues of Dubliners a dozen decades ago. Those who saw nothing immoral in taking a sip of whiskey every now and then were pitted in mortal combat against the temperance crowd, who saw nothing but evil in the sale and consumption of spiritous liquors. In the end, the two antagonists compromised. Liquor sales were allowed, but those who wanted a drink had to pay dearly for it - a result of a burdensome tax on bar owners, who also had to get a stamp of approval from the voters just to open their doors.
The first record of a license to sell alcoholic beverages was in August 1809. Jonathan Sawyer, the founder of Dublin, was granted permission from the justices of the Inferior Court to sell spiritous liquors in his establishment at Sandbar, which later became known as Dublin. From that moment on and probably without interruption, there was always a place where someone could come in and buy a drink. It wasn’t until a decade after the end of the Civil War that those opposing the sale of liquor in Dublin began to put up a well-organized campaign to rid the town of the “demon rum.” In November 1878, a mass meeting was held to discuss plans to abolish whiskey sales in Laurens County.
Dublin, a small village of a couple of hundred residents, was rapidly gaining a reputation as a lawless and morally corrupt place. Blanton Nance, T.P. Sarchett, and W.J. Scarborough operated bar rooms in 1878 - the latter two were also members of the Dublin City Council. In the early months of 1879, George Maddox and George M. Howard opened new establishments, bringing the total number of barrooms in Dublin to five. When you do the math, an amazing statistic becomes apparent. Assume there were three hundred people in Dublin or around the fringes of town. Half of those were women. Deduct about twenty-five percent of the remainder for black citizens and children. The resulting per capita ratio between barrooms and white male adults is approximately one bar for every ten to fifteen men.
Alcohol has a way of bringing emotions out of people, which causes them to act in a way that they might not normally act. The bitter feud between A.E. Corbett and J. Freeman Moore, who married into the feuding Yopp and Ware families respectively, came to a tragic end just after Thanksgiving in 1879, when Moore walked into Howard’s Bar Room, pulled out his gun, and killed Corbett on the spot. Gunfights and killings were commonplace during the era when barrooms were abundant.
The mayoral election of 1881 was the most controversial in Dublin's history. The main issue of the day was whether to drink or not to drink. Two candidates announced their intention to seek the office. W.H. Tillery was favored by the pro liquor crowd, as was attorney David Ware, Jr.. At the urging of many of his friends, Judge T.H. Rowe got in the race. Tillery dropped out of the race when he and Ware pooled their issues. Early on the morning of the election, a crowd of black voters who favored Ware fell in and marched to the courthouse like an army. In those days, votes were counted as the election proceeded. At 2 p.m., Rowe was ahead. Mr. Ware's men went to work. More men were rounded up before the poll closed. The final vote count gave Ware a majority by two votes. Rowe contested the election, alleging that Ware had twelve illegal votes. Six men were indicted for illegally voting for Ware. Ware attempted to have two men indicted for illegally voting for Rowe. One of those allegations was filed against J.M. Moorman, principal of the Colored Academy. This bill was quickly returned without indictment. Two of Rowe's voters were indicted. R.L. Hicks, editor of "The Post" figured the math this way: Ware won by two votes, take away his six voters on the highway to the penitentiary and Mr. Rowe's two indicted voters, and Rowe wins by two. Mr. Rowe's lawyers succeeded in enjoining the city from collecting taxes and alleging that the city charter was illegal. T.H. Rowe failed to prevail in the case. However, a new charter was granted two years later.
In 1882, the pro-liquor council, along with Mayor Tillery, who was in no mood to stop the sale of liquor. By the end of the year, Judge John B. Wolfe prepared a plan to discourage liquor sales. A petition was circulated. Among those signing the petition were the Reverends W.S. Ramsay and Norman McCall of the two Baptist churches and Mrs. W.H. Tillery, the wife of the mayor. With strong support from the leading citizens of the white and black communities, the council approved Wolfe’s plan to require a two-thirds majority approval by the voters for any license and the payment of a high fee. The plan worked. Within a month, Nance, Howard, and J.T. McDaniel closed their establishments. The old beer barrel sign, which hung in front of the old Sarchett stand on the courthouse square and was long a landmark to those looking for something to drink, came down. On January 27, 1882, George Maddox closed the last barroom in town.
Some bar owners were able to get voter approval and managed to pay the hefty license fee. In the summer of 1884, an election was held to elect a mayor and council. The real issue was, of course, liquor. Pro-liquor advocates staged a parade with a fife and drum corps leading a large group of black voters up the street to the courthouse. When their opponents protested, the city marshal, a pro-liquor man himself, failed to act. The sheriff was summoned to break up the aggravating demonstration. The pro-liquor ticket remained in control. Three Methodist leaders, Charles A. Moore, W.J. Flanders, and Kinchen H. Walker, led the opposition that summer.
Following the death of Mayor J.E. Hicks, K. H. Walker, a leading prohibition advocate, was unanimously elected to fill the remainder of Hicks’ term. But in the summer election, J.S. Scarborough was elected mayor along with several other pro-liquor proponents to the city council, leaving the council with a stalemate. There weren’t enough votes to either eliminate the stringent license requirements or to ban liquor sales altogether. In January of 1886, the license of the popular barkeeper, Blanton Nance, expired. There was some doubt that he could get the approval of the voters to stay in business and pay the license fee of two thousand dollars, but in July, Nance was able to reopen the last barroom in town.
Eventually, the temperance folks won the battle. New and influential residents, including Frank G. Corker, who became Dublin’s mayor in the 1890s, were able to rid the city of barrooms, which they saw as a blight on the good name of the city. Their victory was not complete. Folks still drank. They just had to do it secretly. “Blind tigers,” a name given to illegal alcoholic beverage businesses, sprang up all over the city and were the target of city officials for several decades. However, with the eradication of barrooms in the city of Dublin, the city began to grow meteorically. Was it a coincidence, or did the efforts of Dublin’s prohibition advocates really catapult Dublin to become one of the top cities in Georgia at the turn of the Twentieth Century?
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