W. C. T. U. Column

The General Temperance Committee met in the Methodist church on We1nesday evening, April 15, to deelde upon plans for organizing a permanent temperance movement by which a temperance work rnay be carried on from year to year in Ann Arbor, and to procure as soon as poesible for Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti the fi ve-mile law. Kesoluüona were passed, asking for the reorganization of the law and order league. It was also decided to hold a unión temperance ma6s meeting on one Sunday night of each month. Other plans t.re under consideration and will be reported at an early day. May the good work go on until Ann Arbor may stand at the head in moráis as well as in educational advantages, until it may be safe for fathers and mothers to send their children to the University of Michigan without the fear that they may return to them drunkards. We quote the following from a recent article on "The Church and the Liquor Trame," by C. H. Zimmerman: "There is now no considerable difference of opinión as to the proper attitude of the church toward the effects of the liquor trame. The pulpit very generally denounces intemperance. Few ministers of Protestant churches drink. The habit is regarded as inconsistent with their calüng. Thls indicates immense progress since the time when clergymen were often known to drink to excess, and the fermented wine left from sacrament was one of the perquisites of the pastor. Most adult readers can remember when nothing but intoxicating wine was offered them at the communion table. Now it is excluded by many Protestant denominations, The enactment of laws by general assemblies and conferences enjoining total abstinence and forbidding the use of intoxicants as a beverage by the laity is another great step in advance. This much is clear, that as the result of a hundred years of agitation the Christian people of the country have come to the conclusión that they have something to do besides the work of rescuing the victims of the liquor traffic, that they cannot discharge their obligations by exhorting men to temperance and total abstinence, and by saving an occasional drunkard, while the business of making drunkards eoes on unchecked day and night, legalized by the government. Another reason forabolishing the traffic is becoming apparent to the churches. It obstructs the work of the church in saving men from sin; liedges up its way of accoss to human heartg. Every pastor knows that drinking people and those under the influence of the saloon are hardest to reach. He knows, too, that the saloon degrades the people, and so debauches their moral sense that they seem scarcely amenable to spiritual influences. The liquor traffic is thegreatest of all barrière to the work of evangelization.