"That no officer or private soldier shall be detailed to sell
intoxicating drinks as a bartender or otherwise, in any post exchange or
canteen, nor shall any other person be required or allowed to sell such
liquor in any encampment or fort, or on any premises used for military
purposes by the United States; and the Secretary of War is hereby
directed to issue such general order as may be necessary to carry the
provisions of this section into full force and effect."
After vainly trying to find some other method of evading the law,
Secretary Alger, then the head of the War Department, obtained from
Attorney-General Griggs the opinion that the army saloon, known as the
canteen, could run as usual if only the bartenders were not soldiers.
Griggs said:
"The designation of one class of individuals as forbidden to do a
certain thing raises a just inference that all other classes not
mentioned are not forbidden. A declaration that soldiers shall not be
detailed to sell intoxicating drinks in post exchanges necessarily
implies that such sale is not unlawful when conducted by others than
soldiers.... The act having forbidden the employment of soldiers as
bartenders or salesmen of intoxicating drinks, it would be lawful and
appropriate for the managers of the post exchanges to employ civilians
for that purpose. Of course, employment is a matter of contract, and not
of requirement or permission."
This opinion, pronounced anarchy by every judge and every lawyer,
outside of the President's Cabinet, that has spoken upon it, is upheld
by Secretary Root, the new head of the War Department; and by President
McKinley.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Daughter of a Republican, by Bernie Babcock