Good Tobacco Business

"Good Tobacco Business" By Will H. Brown

The Canadian Cigar and Tobacco Journal, last December, made some surprising admissions, in an effort to encourage to- bacco dealers to cheer up, despite unfavorable conditions and the cries of calamity howlers, saying that men will smoke, re- gardless of any other consideration. Its first statement is rather mild: "Even though the business man must curtail some of his 'luxury' money, he will continue to smoke his favorite brand of cigars." But the next declaration is brutally frank: "The worker will, even though jobless, continue to enjoy his cigarette. In the line-up of unemployed in the cities, the applicants, without an actual meal in sight, puff their cigarettes. The smoker will not do without his smoke" Then comes this cold-blooded comment: "It may be poor economics, but it is good tobacco business." Sure, it is "good tobacco business," but that any one could gloat over such facts seems incredible. It matters not that a man is out of work with not a cent in his pocket, and not a meal in sight, so long as he smokes. Yes, it is "good tobacco business" for a man to spend his last dollar for tobacco, leaving his wife and children to be fed and clothed by others, as many a man has done, while he begs his smokes from other slaves to the habit! It is "good tobacco business" to devote land, labor and money to producing the weed, even though the land, labor and money are sorely needed in producing food to keep people from starving! — This is all good tobacco business but were it possible for a visitor to drop down on our earth from some other planet, he would be excused for thinking us a very low order of human beings.

A Crime Against Our Boys and Girls One of the deplorable conditions in the United States is the shortage of homes, depriving several million children of the right to live in comfort and amid helpful family surroundings. At the 1920 Building Trades Conference in Chicago the state- ment was made that the shortage of homes had reached one million. Later estimates place it at nearer two million.