James Larkin Quotes
I never stood in a public house bar and alcoholic drink never touched my lips.
Larkin, James. Testimony at the Askwith Inquiry. Dublin, Oct. 1913. Cited in Nevin, Donal. James Larkin: Lion of the Fold. Gill & Macmillan, 1998, p. 197.
This pledge was taken by over half a million Americans in Mathew's 1849-1851 tour of the United States promoting the Teetotal Abstinence Society.
Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini. Early in his career, as Secretary to the Emperor, he was assigned to oversee the education of the young king of Bohemia. Piccolomini’s advice of temperance was not at all based on theological reasons as drinking was rampant, even among the clergy. Also, he recognized the major effect of peer pressure on teenagers as it affects drinking behavior.
Hitler neither smoked tobacco or drank alcohol. They appear to have been his only virtues.
In 1931 prohibition was a major political issue. Mayor William Hale Thompson organized campaign parades complete with circus animals. A camel carried the following sign.
The distinction between recreational drinking and heavy drinking is a subtle one and rarely made until modern times. Most leaders who would not have heavy drinkers in positions of responsibility were usually themselves teetotalers and they were very rare. Heavy drinkers and alcoholics have been in positions of responsibility throughout history including modern times—eg House Ways & Means Chairman Wilbur Mills and Russian President Boris Yeltsin. Peter was unusual in that he made the distinction.
Most people only know about Garrison’s abolition crusade. However he had others like temperance.
James Larkin, sometimes known as Jim Larkin, was an Irish republican, socialist and trade union leader. He was one of the founders of the Irish Labour Party along with James Connolly and William O'Brien, and later the founder of the Irish Worker League (a communist party which was recognised by the Comintern as the Irish section of the world communist movement), as well as the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union (ITGWU), the Workers' Union of Ireland (the two unions later merged to become SIPTU, Ireland's largest trade union). Along with Connolly and Jack White, he was also a founder of the Irish Citizen Army (ICA; a paramilitary group which was integral to both the Dublin lock-out and the Easter Rising). Larkin was a leading figure in the Syndicalist movement.
