"Men and women of New Jersey—" On the stage of Krueger's Auditorium in Newark stood Dwight Whitney Morrow, Ambassador to Mexico. Republican candidate for the U. S. Senate. It was 9 o'clock of a rainy evening. Mr. Morrow's blue-grey suit looked mussed and wrinkled after an all-day auto tour among Jersey voters. In his hand he held a manuscript, his first campaign speech, from which he was about to read. No hard-boiled political stumpster, he seemed shy and nervous before the 2,000 clerks, farmers, Negroes, laborers, socialites — Republican voters all — who packed the hall. A swift smile from Mrs. Morrow who sat in a box with Manhattan Banker Otto Hermann Kahn gave him encouragement. As the din of sirens and noise makers died, Mr. Morrow cleared his throat, plunged straightway into his speech in a strong clear voice : "I come before the Republican voters of New Jersey as a candidate for the office of United States Senator. ... I am sensible of the great honor. ... If I am elected to the Senate, my only obligation will run to the voters of the State and my own conscience. . . . Tonight I am going to discuss Prohibition [loud applause]. It is a question which constantly confuses moral principles with the art of government. . . . "It is not my purpose to discuss the merits of Prohibition as a policy. That is not the issue. The issue is whether it is practicable and in the public interest to apply that policy to the United States as a whole through the agency of the Federal Government. . . . "In many States where it is in accord with popular sentiment, national Prohibition is generally believed to be successful. In other States the system works badly because the people and their officials do not cooperate. ... Is it well that large portions of our people should conceive of the Federal Government as an alien and even a hostile Power? Is it well to have, as a result, a lawless unregulated liquor traffic attended by shocking corruption? It is not fair to assume that all resentment against national Prohibition is due to a desire for unlimited license to be intemperate. . . .
"I bring to you no panacea for this deplorable condition. I know of no magical solution. ... I believe the way out of the present difficulty . . . involves a repeal of the 18th Amendment [tremendous applause] and the substitution therefor of an Amendment which will restore to the States the power to determine their policy toward the liquor traffic and vest in the Federal Government power to give all possible protection and assistance to those States that desire complete prohibition. . . .
"So long as the 18th Amendment and the statutes thereunder are the law of the land, I favor generous appropriations for their enforcement. ... I favor the use of such appropriations for that portion of enforcement which is pre-eminently the duty of the Federal Government . . . keeping liquor from coming into the country and passing into interstate commerce. . . . Until it performs that task, it might well leave all local police duty with the States. . . .
"I have tried to avoid the words 'wet' and 'dry.' Men labeled wet may be as much opposed to the saloon as men labeled dry. The saloon must not come back. The people of the U. S. are well rid of it. ...