“The greatest curse,” said he, growing warm with his subject—“the greatest curse ever introduced among them, has been the curse of rum! I can conceive of no more awful and horrible, and at the same time more effective lesson, than that which may be learned from the consequences of the burning firewater upon the habits and happiness of the poor Indians. A whole people – the inhabitants of a mighty continent – are crushed by it, and debased into a condition lower than the beast of the field. Is it not a pitiful thought? The bravest warriors—the wise old chiefs—even women and children—tempted by our people to drink this fatal poison, until, as year and year passed away, they found themselves deprived not only of their lands and what property they hitherto owned, but of everything that made them noble and grand as a nation! Rum has done great evil in the world, but hardly ever more by wholesale than in the case of the American savage.” (Franklin Evans 10)
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The paragraph makes the greatest point of the need of temperance as it talks of the downfall of an entire nation. The first sentence describes alcohol as a curse “The greatest curse,”. The author uses the word lesson, which the overall book is a lesson in the dangers of intemperance. It speaks of not only losing one’s possessions but also losing ones self worth and pride, “deprived not only of their lands and what property they hitherto owned, but of everything that made them noble and grand”. In other portions of the book it, illustrates individual stories of intemperance.
Franklin uses the Native Americans as an example of the destructive power of rum. His tirade against rum has substantial historical evidence. According to the encyclopedia the majority of Native Americans had little to no exposure to alcohol prior to Europeans coming to America. The article states that alcohol did not become a real issue until Rum began to be distilled from sugar produced in the West Indies. Native Americans had a greater affinity and weakness for rum than Europeans. Traders used Rum to influence Native Americans during negotiations. As Wayne Curtis Writes, “John Leder, in his 1672 account of trade with the Indians, boasted that with liquor one could ‘dispose them to a humour giving you ten times the value of your commodity’”(75). Colonists and Europeans knew the devastating effects of rum on the Native Americans and still allowed the trading of rum for furs. Ben Franklin wrote in his autobiography, “As those people are extremely apt to get drunk, and, when so, are very quarrelsome and disorderly, we strictly forbad the selling any liquor to them; and when they complained of this restriction, we told them that if they would continue sober during the treaty, we would give them plenty of rum when business was over…In the evening, hearing a great noise among them, the commissioners walked out to see what was the matter. We found they had made a great bonfire in the middle of the square; they were all drunk, men and women, quarreling and fighting. Their dark-colored bodies, half naked, seen only by the gloomy light of the bonfire, running after and beating one another with firebrands, accompanied by their horrid yellings, formed a scene the most resembling our ideas of hell that could well be imagined…”(192-193) http://books.google.com/books?id=1AMOAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA192&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U39sdiRgpvDd4bFQxngK9JUJY98mQ&ci=215%2C378%2C568%2C400&edge=0. Although there were attempts by both whites and Native American’s to curtail and try to stop the rampant and destructive forces of alcohol, an unhealthy relationship between Native Americans and alcohol still remains. According to this report excessive alcohol consumption is the leading cause of preventable death in Indian Country. Further information about current alcohol abuse among Native Americans: http://www.drugfree.org/Intervention/Resources/MulticulturalCharts.aspx
“Fire-Water”: http://www.authentichistory.com/diversity/native/alcohol/Souvenir_Alcohol_Flask-Cherokee_Indian_Reservation_NC.html
Works Cited:
Curtis, Wayne. And a bottle of rum: a history of the New World in ten cocktails. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2006, 2007
Franklin, Benjamin. Benjamin Franklin: His Autobiography. New York: Derby & Jackson, 1859.