seldom does he risk his own safety in being the last man to hand the goods to the consumer and to take the money.
But notwithstanding all this carefulness, the bulk of the arrests made in the United States have been among Jews. The bulk of the liquor permits—a guess of 95 per cent would not be too high—are in the hands of Jews. More and more the Jews are being appointed as Prohibition enforcement officers at the central points of distribution. It is a fact, as Rabbi Franklin showed, that part of the trouble arises over the abuse of what has been called “rabbinical wine,” but big as it seems by itself, it is really a small part in comparison with the whole. Numbers of lesser rabbis have profited from the sale of liquor, no doubt of that. And not only among their own people, but from any people making the demand. “If you sign a Jewish name you can get it,” is the watchword. Newspaper offices have been kept “wet” in some cases by “rabbinical wine,” which accounts for the dribble of “wet” propaganda in the so-called humorous and other columns of the evening journals.
It happens that “rabbinical wine” is a euphemism for whisky, gin, Scotch, champagne, vermuth, absinthe, or any other kind of hard liquor. The stocks that existed when Prohibition went into force have not only not decreased, but have actually increased, because of the increase in the “doctoring” of the stuff. It has been cheapened, its bulk has been increased and it has been made, if anything, more deadly than before. “As fatal as bootleg whisky” is a saying founded on thousands of deaths.
The wholesale stocks of compounded liquor remained in the hands of the men who owned them, while the retail stocks in stores and saloons had to be disposed of. That was one of the first big mistakes—that the little fellow was compelled to get rid of his stock, while the big fellow was permitted to keep his. The so-called rabbis, who had advance information of the special privileges which the Jews were to enjoy under the Prohibition law, were very active in buying up the smaller stocks and