Note A — What I Saw in Lithuania

When I presented to the president of Lithuania, Mr. Anthony Smetona, the said recommendation of the Lithuanian Total Abstinance Organization in America, which is indeed a suggestion to introduce the prohibition of the manufacture and sale of intoxicating drinks in Lithuania—in other words, to imitate the American government in this respect, he expressed himself sufficiently in favor of it, but it is quite self-evident that he, as the President of Lithuania alone, cannot accomplish it. In our conversation he made a suggestion to me that I should strive to get a chance to speak publicly in Kaunas and in other places as much as possible on the subject of total abstinance, to which I expressed my hope that some of the priests of Kaunas, no doubt, would give me a chance there. Then the President said to me: "I have read in the Lithuanian American newspapers so much of you as the apostle of total abstinance among Lithuanians in America, I wish you would do the same here." In Lithuania the opportunity to speak to the people is offered only on Sunday, and in that case it is better in the church. So I had an opportunity on Sundays and delivered sermons in seven churches. In one a good number of priests as guests were assembled and listened to my sermon. They were pleased and at dinner table were discussing about American prohibition. A great many of them are boldly opposed to it; some even expressing their doubt about total abstinance. But they all were curious to know what those Lithuanians will do who were arrested and punished for manufacturing at home and selling intoxicants without the license of the government, after hearing of that sermon in the church. Lithuanians in Lithuania have learned from the Germans when they were in occupation, not only how to make intoxicants, but also soap, sugar, etc.

At first I considered it might be an insult to speak about total abstinance in Lithuania, after the horrible war; that those people could not get any attraction to intoxicants having witnessed such horrors of the war. But I was soon informed by some good souls of the necessity of total abstinance and of the dangers and temptations of many to intoxication. So I could not part with Lithuania without making an effort to sow the seed that might produce some good effects in the field of total abstinance.

As soon as I came to Boston and Worcester the Lithuanian Total Abstinance Central Committee held its quarter-annual convention and caught me unexpectedly and cross-examined me on the situation in Lithuania. I was obliged to give an account of all I had done in Lithuania for total abstinance and prohibition. I told them that the President alone could not introduce prohibition, and that they will wait until a general convention of Lithuanians will take place. Then they appointed me to write to the President for an official answer to their communication, and that I should strive to find some way by which the Total Abstinance Organization of America could unite in co-operation with the same organization in Lithuania. So I undertook to do so, and am trying now to perform my obligation, but at present the correspondence with Lithuania is very slow.