--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 29 number: 6 published: 1926-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, “Editor’s Table,” *Improvement Era* 29, no. 6 (April 1926): 595–597." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2906unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera2906unse start_page: 595 end_page: 597 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1926-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2906unse publication_year: 1926 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1926, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Editor’s Table Editors ^Table Do You Want To Be A Slave? There are two evils, tobacco and drink, that are constantly beck- oning to young men, and to women also, now, to come under the frightful, life-destroying burden of their slavery. Nine billion cigar- ettes were smoked by women in 1925. All kinds of easy approaches are presented by certain dealers and other interested people to lead to these pits of slavery. Jeremiah of old fittingly characterized this class of offenders when he said: "Among my people are found wicked men: they lay wait, as he that setteth snares; they set a trap, they catch men." Tobacco dealers and manufacturers are constantly ensnaring the youth of the land in the nicotine net. Here is one method used by a tobacco company: They send for the names of young men, espe- cially those who are not smokers, and the dates of their birth; then send a letter of congratulation, a package of cigarettes, a booklet ex- plaining "how good they are — just smoke 'em." Jeremiah's words again apply: "They are waxen fat, they shine: yea, they overpass the deeds of the wicked." What do they care for the happiness or success of any young man to whom such a gift is sent. Theirs is reprehensible conduct, pretended friendship, a diabolical trap to enslave, for gain, designs existing "in the heart of conspiring men." Another kind of trap is the furnishing of free cigars and cigarettes at college functions, by local dealers and firms, with the motive, undoubtedly, to induce non-smokers to take their first smoke, with an opportunity to develop into regular smokers, and hence regular customers of the devil's traps — the tobacco stores. Will H. Brown writes that dealers in tobacco sometimes scatter cigarettes in the streets near schools, to bait the boys attending there. Candy in the shape and color of cigarettes are often sold to children for no other purpose than inducing the "attitude" of smoking, with the hope that later the boys will smoke real cigarettes. "Catch the boys, if you can," appears to be the slogan; "if not, get the young men when they enter college." Tobacco makes a strong person nervous, slow, undependable, unreliable, uncertain, unmanly. It gives nothing, absolutely nothing, in return, except harm, a physical and moral weakness and an un- bearable smell. Tobacco, alcohol and drugs change good men and women into brutes, who think of nothing1, but the satisfying of their own dirty desires. "Tobacco destroys life, health, morals, property, makes new problems for juvenile courts, * * * and its growth and use create a total economic loss to the nation in land and work amounting to billions." 596 IMPROVEMENT ERA "I would to God that every cigar I smoke would make me deathly sick," said a bank president to a friend. When asked why he didn't quit, he replied: "I can't quit. I'd gladly give $10 a day to be free from the habit." So absolute is the slavery to tobacco. Why be a slave? Do not start; nor enter any of its smooth approaches, or traps. Dr. James J. Waring, then Associate Professor of Medicine, University of Colorado, addressed the membership of the Chamber of Commerce, Salt Lake City, more than a year ago. Parenthetically, in passing, this was a veritable powder magazine in which to strike such a light, but you will notice he spoke of women, not mentioning men! His subject was "Salt Lake City, a Health Center." He said: "We are entitled to pure air, water and food, and if anti-spitting and anti-smoking laws were enforced, we would have better communities. I believe two of the great dangers to the American people rest in the increased use of tobacco and alcohol by women of the country. Increase of the use of tobacco among women is appalling. Five years ago I hesitated to ask a woman if she smoked; I never hesitate today." Vice-President Dawes, just before New Years, gave wise and timely counsel to the pages of Congress. He urged them to put under their feet the things that are causing such degeneration among the young people of today, and told them to be clean themselves and stand against the crowd when necessary: "Don't be hip-flask boys, don't smoke, don't swear, and don't chew tobacco," the Vice-President advised them. No doubt, the young people need this counsel. For many of us believe that tobacco and liquor are the natural concomitants and, in many instances, the actual incitants to demoralization and crime. Herbert Hoover says: "There is no agency in the world today that is more seriously affecting the health, the education, the efficiency and the character of boys and girls than the cigarette habit, yet very little attention is paid to it. Nearly every delinquent boy is a cigarette smoker, which certainly has much to do with it. Cigarettes are a scource of crime. To neglect it at its source is a short-sighted policy unworthy of a nation of our intelligence." He also wrote President Coolidge, "We in America are far behind what a national conscience should demand for the public protection of our children." It appears that here in Utah most smokers and many police and other officers of the law have settled in the conviction that there is no regulation for the sale and use of tobacco and cigarettes, either for old or young people. Since a liberating amendment on the cigarette law was passed by what might be termed the recent pari-mutuel "gam- bling" legislature of the state, such an idea seems to have possessed officers, until now all bars appear to be let down. There are still some regulations, however, that officers should enforce. Now is the opportune time to line up for the next election. We need strong and determined legislators and officers, who will not imperil the law by compromise. We should pay little attention to straw votes favoring open doors to positive evils. No stone should be EDITORS' TABLE 597 left unturned that will aid in protecting our youth from the frightful, soul-and-body-destroying slavery of tobacco and liquor. No good Latter-day Saint will either use or sell these things. Our slogan is: "We stand for the non-sale and non-use of tobacco," and "for State and Nation-wide prohibition" of the sale and use of liquor. The public carries a heavy responsibility. When a law is adopted and put into operation, good friends1, we! cannot get results if we go away and forget it. Enacting a law and then thinking the work is done is reprehensible on our part. We must breathe new life and spirit into laws that are lagging, as in the case of these liquor and to- bacco laws. First, by believing and obeying them; then, fighting for them, and seeing that they are obeyed. We must neither break, nor permit them to be broken. This1 applies both to officers and the public. We must fight until we win. — A. Books A new edition of A Compendium of the Doctrines of the Gospel, by the late Franklin D. Richards, one of the twelve apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and Elder James A. Little, has been issued by the Deseret Book Company. This volume of 290 pages, close print, con- tains a mass of valuable information on the principles and doctrines of the gospel from the standard works of the Church, namely: the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price; as well as from sermons, and from the Articles of Faith, used as guides in faith and doctrines. In a preface it is stated that a steady and insistent demand has made it necessary to print another edition of this splendid work. The book contains more than twenty-two pages of gems from the History of Joseph Smith; also a list of the First Presidencies and Twelve Apostles of the Church up to and including the year 1925; together with a Book of Mormon chronology; and a chapter on the temples and sacred places of the Latter-day Saints. Deseret Book Company, Salt Lake City, Utah. Children of the Promise, or "On Eagles' Wings" is the title of a book of 218 pages, containing stories from the Old Testament, written expressly for the First Intermediate department of the Sunday school, for the use of the second-year class, price $1. The author is Elder John Henry Evans, and the writing is designed to give both unity and direction to the varied mate- rials to be found in the history of the Israelites. The author, in his preface, says that the word which the Lord told Moses to tell the Israelites, as found in Exodus 19:4-6, is, in his judgment, the point of view from which the chapters in his book should be read and taught. These verses may well applv to modern Israel: "Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself; now, therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenants, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people. For all the earth is mine, and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests and an holy nation." Exiles, Pilgrims and Pioneers and The Messenger of Truth is the title of a thirty-two page book of verse by Charles W. Dunn, of Logan, Utah, which was published under date of December 25, 1925. The two divisions of the book are each subdivided into three parts, which adds facility and pleasure to the reading. The poems are all based on familiar and interest- ing historic gospel themes.