The years of the Civil War in the United States and the subsequent period of reconstruction witnessed a serious setback to the cause of temperance reform, which had flourished in the earlier part of the century. During the seventies, however, there appeared various movements which brought the temperance cause again to the front.
One such movement had its inception in 1871, at Gardiner, Maine. Mr. I.K. Osgood, once a successful merchant, who had been brought to poverty through drink, was returning to his home late one night, when he saw his loyal wife sitting by the window in their wretched home, waiting for him. His heart stirred by pity and remorse, he firmly resolved that, with God's help, he would never again drink intoxicating liquor. This resolution he kept, and after a time induced another one of his friends to sign the pledge of total abstinence. On January 19, 1872, these two gentlemen appointed a meeting, inviting the public to come and hear them tell what rum had done to them and the benefits they had received since becoming abstainers. At the close of their recital eight of their drinking companions signed the pledge. Thus was launched the first "Reform Club."
The Red Ribbon Clubs
About two years later a brilliant physician and surgeon, Dr. Reynolds, of Bangor, Maine, had become caught in the toils of strong drink. He tried in vain several times to break off the habit. While attending a prayer meeting one night he sought and received divine power to overcome, and at once tried to help others like himself. He, too, organized a "Reform Club," on September 10, 1874, and its membership grew rapidly.
Believing that he was called of God to engage in this work, Dr. Reynolds gave up the practice of his profession and entered the lecture field. Within a year, in Maine alone, he led out in organizing no less than 45,000 reformed drinkers into local Reform Clubs. He carried the campaign into other states, including Michigan. The badge of this movement was a red ribbon, and the clubs became known as the "Red Ribbon Reform Clubs." Hundreds of thousands of drinkers were led by these and other earnest workers to sign the pledge. (August F. Fehlandt, A Century of Drink Reform in the United States, 230-235. New York: Eaton and Mains, 1904.)
The Woman's Christian Temperance Union
In this decade, on November 18, 1874, the Woman's Christian Temperance Union was organized. The next few years witnessed great activity on the part of this organization, with which is associated the name of Miss Frances E. Willard, who in 1879 was elected as its president.
The influence both of the Reform Clubs and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union reached Battle Creek, Michigan, and drew the following comment from the editor of The Health Reformer:
"The present temperance movement, under the auspices of the Reform Clubs and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, is the most remarkable reformation of the kind which this country has ever witnessed. ... The work is spreading with wonderful rapidity, and we sincerely hope it may do a vast amount of permanent good. Great good has already been done in our own city. Scores of men who had been notorious for drunkenness and dissipation have become sober; and from being idle vagabonds they are now filling offices of usefulness and trust with entire satisfaction."--The Health Reformer, August, 1877.
Mrs. White entered heartily into the advocacy of the temperance cause, and earnestly sought to induce her fellow believers to unite with others in forwarding this noble work.
One of the first opportunities for co-operation with the temperance forces was afforded in the early part of 1874, in the city of Oakland, California, where Elders Cornell and Canright were conducting a series of tent meetings. A local option campaign was in progress, and the temperance forces were active. Some of the leaders in the movement requested the use of the large tent for a temperance rally.
While the preachers were debating in their minds whether the granting of this request might not detract from the solemn subjects they had to present to the people, they received a message from Mrs. White. Not only did she urge them to permit the use of the tent for the temperance cause, but she encouraged the believers in the city and vicinity to do all in their power to bring the campaign to a successful issue. "By pen and voice and vote" she then, and consistently through the years that followed, urged those whom she could influence to wage the fight for temperance reform.
Mrs. White's counsel was followed. For several nights temperance rallies were held in the large tent; and when the temperance forces had won in the election, a great victory meeting was held. On this occasion the mayor of the city expressed the thanks of himself and his fellow citizens for the splendid co-operation they had received from the tent company, and he urged his audience now to give them a favorable hearing in the presentation of their message.
"Must Begin-at Our Tables"
A few months later very important and timely instruction was given for the church, pointing out certain weaknesses of the temperance campaign as it was then being conducted, and very definitely setting forth the only effective method of approach to the problem of intemperance. The vision in which this instruction was given occurred on the afternoon of January 3, 1875. Mrs. White was suffering from a severe attack of influenza, and she had become so weakened that the physicians at the Health Reform Institute expressed anxiety. A few of the ministers came to her home and offered prayer in her behalf, carrying out the instruction found in James 5:13-16. After others had prayed for her, she began to pray, and while in prayer was taken off in vision. Soon after coming out of the vision she dressed for meeting and walked to the church, where she spoke to a waiting congregation.
A very important part of this vision relating to health reform and temperance work was soon published. It may now be read in Testimonies for the Church 3:560-570. Regarding the ineffectiveness of the temperance movement as popularly carried forward, she wrote in that connection:
"Intemperance is increasing everywhere, notwithstanding the earnest efforts made during the past year to stay its progress. I was shown that the giant power of intemperance will not be controlled by any such efforts as have been made. The work of temperance must begin in our families, at our tables."--Testimonies for the Church 3:562.
Here was clearly pointed out the impossibility of effecting true reform while the warfare of the temperance forces was restricted to its field of action against alcoholic liquors. The evils of tobacco and of the milder stimulants and narcotics were largely ignored. Men were induced to sign the pledge sometimes in meeting halls reeking with tobacco smoke. Mrs. White referred to men who, even while speaking against the use of liquor and deploring the evil of intemperance, would eject tobacco juice from their mouths. She asked, "What power can the tobacco devotee have to stay the progress of intemperance?" She said further:
"There must be a revolution in our world upon the subject of tobacco before the ax is laid at the root of the tree. We press the subject still closer. Tea and coffee are fostering the appetite which is developing for stronger stimulants, as tobacco and liquor. And we come still closer home, to the daily meals, the tables spread in Christian households. Is temperance practiced in all things? Are the reforms which are essential to health and happiness carried out there?"--Ibid., 569, 570.
"Intemperance commences at our tables. The appetite is indulged until its indulgence becomes second nature. By the use of tea and coffee an appetite is formed for tobacco, and this encourages the appetite for liquors."--Ibid., 563.
Speaking to Parents
Addressing the parents, Mrs. White declared that they "should make it their first business to understand the laws of life and health, that nothing shall be done by them in the preparation of food, or through any other habits, which will develop wrong tendencies in their children."--Ibid., 568.
Parents, she declared, hold the key position as potential temperance reformers, and the dining table is a more important arena for effective temperance teaching than is the lecture hall. Though "the demon of intemperance" be of "giant strength," yet she assured parents of success if they would "begin a crusade against intemperance" in their own families, teaching their children from "their very infancy" the principles that they should follow through life. Ibid., 567.
In confirmation of Mrs. White's assertion that the temperance cause as carried forward was far from efficient is the following statement by Mr. Fehlandt:
"The ranks of the drunkard were being recruited, not alone from the moderate drinkers, but from those who had taken the pledge as well. They meant to keep the pledge, but fell before the power of a returning appetite. How many went down again no one knows. Perhaps not far from one half. When the pledge covered only spirituous liquors, the trouble was readily enough seen, and the pledge was extended. But yet it did not avail. With the safeguard and support of a pledge of total abstinence from all intoxicants, men still lapsed into their former habits. Of the half million that were helped to their feet temporarily by the Washingtonian crusade, it was estimated that two thirds again fell."--A Century of Drink Reform in the United States, 104, 105.
Mrs. White Lectured on Temperance
It is of interest to note that, as Mr. Fehlandt points out, the inclusion of only spirituous liquors in the pledge was recognized as a main reason for the lapse of many who had signed the pledge; so the pledge was extended to cover all alcoholic beverages. This was a move in the right direction, but did not go far enough. To Seventh-day Adventists God graciously gave instruction that the pledge of abstinence should include tobacco, tea, and coffee and all unwholesome foods that tended to create an abnormal appetite. It was with this counsel in mind that Mrs. White directed her testimony in behalf of temperance, that the ax should be laid at the very root of the tree.
She found opportunity frequently to speak in behalf of temperance. One Sunday afternoon, in the summer of 1876, she spoke to no less than 20,000 people on a camp ground at Groveland, Massachusetts. At the close of the service she accepted an invitation of officers of the Haverhill Reform Club to repeat the address at the city hall the following night. On that occasion the hall, which would accommodate about 1,100 persons, "was filled to its utmost capacity with the very elite of Haverhill's society, professional men of all classes, officers of the city, and the most intelligent of the people." The Review and Herald, September 7, 1876.
The next summer Elder and Mrs. White had journeyed from California to Battle Creek, Michigan, at which time Elder White carried very heavy responsibilities at the publishing house and the college and in the plans for the new sanitarium building. After a few weeks of a strenuous program, he was physically exhausted, and it was feared that he would suffer a general breakdown in health. Preparations were being made for a period of retirement among the mountains of Colorado, when, as Mrs. White says, "a voice seemed to say to me, 'Put the armor on. I have work for you to do in Battle Creek.' The voice seemed so plain that I involuntarily turned to see who was speaking. I saw no one, and at the sense of the presence of God my heart was broken in tenderness before Him. When my husband entered the room, I told him the exercises of my mind. We wept and prayed together. Our arrangements had been made to leave in three days, but now all our plans were changed."--Testimonies for the Church 4:272.
The reason why the Lord instructed Elder and Mrs. White to change their plans was made manifest in a few days. They received a delegation from the representatives of "the Battle Creek Reform Club, six hundred strong, and the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, two hundred and sixty strong." Ibid., 275. These had come to request their co-operation and that of the sanitarium staff in a temperance mass meeting that was to be held soon in the city of Battle Creek.
Plans for a Health and Temperance Society
Barnum's great menagerie and circus visited the city on the twenty-eighth of June, and the leaders of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union provided an immense temperance restaurant to accommodate the crowds who came from the neighboring country, hoping thus to keep many of them from visiting the saloons, where they would be tempted to drink. The large tent, owned by the Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists and capable of seating five thousand people, was offered for this occasion. Among the heavily laden tables was one set in the center of the pavilion, which was bountifully supplied by the sanitarium with wholesome fruits, grains, and vegetables, and this table formed the chief attraction and was largely patronized.
In the evening, by invitation of the committee on arrangements, including the mayor of the city and the cashier of the principal bank, Mrs. White spoke on the subject of Christian temperance. "God helped me that evening," she says, "and although I spoke ninety minutes, the crowd of fully five thousand persons listened in almost breathless silence."--Ibid., 275.
The activity of Mrs. White and of the editors of the Good Health in the temperance cause, in its broadest sense, was commendable. But much more than this was needed. The time had come for a great forward movement that would enlist the rank and file of Seventh-day Adventists, and this was now to be launched. In the latter part of December, 1878, as a fitting conclusion to a day especially set apart for fasting and prayer, a meeting was held in the publishing house chapel in Battle Creek, Michigan, "to consider the propriety of organizing a national health and temperance society." The Review and Herald, January 9, 1879.
The Organization Completed
At a second meeting held on New Year's Day further steps were taken, and on January 5 the organization was completed. Dr. J.H. Kellogg was elected as president. In his opening address he pointed to the early work of Joseph Bates in organizing the temperance society at Fairhaven, and to the appropriateness that the denomination of which he was a prominent member, should be the first to organize a temperance society, "with a thoroughgoing temperance platform, and a comprehensive pledge." (Ibid.)
No temperance society heretofore organized had gone beyond urging the prohibition of the use of alcoholic beverages and tobacco. The American Health and Temperance Association adopted as its ideal pledge the following: "I do hereby solemnly affirm that with the help of God I will wholly abstain from the voluntary use of alcohol, tobacco, tea, coffee, opium, and all other narcotics and stimulants in any form." (Ibid.) This broader promise was called the Teetotal Pledge.
For the benefit of those who might not be prepared to go to such lengths in self-denial, provision was made for a second, an antirum and antitobacco pledge; and a third, an anti-whisky pledge. Thus provision was made for "three grades of membership."
The object of the association was declared to be the promotion of the health of its members and the advancement of the interests of the cause of "temperance in its truest and broadest sense, by the circulation of health and temperance literature, by securing popular lectures upon those subjects in various parts of the country, and by the wide circulation of suitable pledges and earnest efforts to secure numerous signers."--Ibid.
During the next camp meeting season, as the Teetotal Pledge was circulated among Seventh-day Adventists, there was brought to light the need of a revival in health reform among our church members. With the lapse of time since the importance of health reform living had been pressed upon the people, some had grown careless and had returned to the use of tea and coffee. Some, indeed, it was learned, had never given them up, and occasionally a church member was found who was still enslaved to tobacco. A few, even among the ministers, complained that a pledge including tea and coffee was too strong, for they had not yet gained the victory on these points.
Other Matters Attract Attention
It would not be true to fact to maintain that there ever had been a time when all the church members adopted heartily the principles of health reform as they were presented and taught on this point. Mrs. White had written as late as 1870:
"There has been a war in the hearts of some ever since the health reform was first introduced. They have felt the same rebellion as did the children of Israel when their appetites were restricted on their journey from Egypt to Canaan. Professed followers of Christ, who have all their lives consulted their own pleasure and their own interests, their own ease and their own appetites, are not prepared to change their course of action and live for the glory of God, imitating the self-sacrificing life of their unerring Pattern."--Testimonies for the Church 2:394.
The resolutions adopted not only by the state conferences, but by the General Conference in 1879, indicate recognition of quite a general backsliding on health practices, and urge a renewal of faithfulness in this important matter. The health reform had been first introduced as the advance step in the message and was given a prominence that aided in its general adoption.
As time went on, however, other issues arose to attract the attention of the people. In the work of the ministry the health reform began to take a secondary place. Aside from The Health Reformer and the few health publications, no regular continued effort was provided for systematic health education. Many new converts were added to the faith who received but little instruction in the health principles. Some of the young ministers and licentiates had not been trained to appreciate the importance of the reforms and were not fitted to instruct the people.
The organization of the American Health and Temperance Association, with its revival of the principles of health, together with plans for individual activity, did much to check these backward moves and to impart new life and vigor to the reform.
In the reports of the camp meetings held during the summer of 1879, prominent mention was made of the work of the organization of temperance societies. In reporting a meeting at Nevada, Missouri, Elder Butler wrote:
"A strong effort was made in behalf of health reform and the temperance cause. Sister White had pointed reproofs for us because of our backslidden condition on this subject. She spoke very solemnly and represented our condition as being grievous in the sight of God, because we have not made better use of the light we have had."--The Review and Herald, June 12, 1879.
A Rally Meeting
Among those present at this meeting was Colonel Hunter, a recent convert to the faith. Following an earnest appeal by Mrs. White in behalf of the temperance cause, this gentleman arose and related the story of his conversion. He stated that he had drunk enough liquor to float a ship. He had already given up liquor and tobacco, and now he declared that the coffee he had drunk for breakfast would be his last. He asked for the privilege of writing his name at the top of the pledge list.
Elder Butler, the president of the conference, then arose and made a confession to the effect that he had not been as forward in the temperance reform as he should have been. Though strictly temperate in his own habits, yet he had not seen the necessity of signing the pledge. He now expressed his conviction that in this attitude he had been standing in the way of others who ought to sign it. He wrote his name beneath that of Colonel Hunter. The signatures of Elder James White and his wife were then written down, followed by that of Elder E.W. Farnsworth. Regarding the response of the congregation, Elder Butler writes further:
"Some who had been unwilling slaves to the tobacco habit pledged themselves to leave off and, by the grace of God, overcome this evil habit. One hundred and thirty-two signed the pledge to leave alcohol, tobacco, tea, coffee, opium, and all other narcotics and stimulants forever. Some others signed the anti-liquor and tobacco pledge. ... God evidently blessed this temperance movement, and we were encouraged to go forward to help all within the reach of our influence to take their stand on the broad platform of true temperance, and to leave off all hurtful indulgences."--Ibid.
At the camp meetings in other states during this same summer, people readily signed their names to the pledge and consecrated themselves to the work not only of personal reform, but of seeking to influence their friends and neighbors to discard the use of unwholesome food and drink. Somewhat on the plan of the Reform Clubs, local health and temperance clubs were organized by the churches. After returning from the western camp meetings, Elder and Mrs. White led out in an enthusiastic campaign that resulted in the organization of the Battle Creek Health and Temperance Club, including the original 150 signers and 250 more.
In the course of time pledges were prepared, including other health habits than those pertaining merely to the abstinence from stimulants and narcotics. Pledges were adapted for children, and a juvenile campaign was organized. Pledges adapted for men and women were formulated, upholding the standards of social purity.
A Widening Work
The activity of the members of the health and temperance societies was not limited to the signing of pledges. They circulated many thousands of pages of well-prepared educational literature, and some qualified themselves as lecturers, freely giving their time and energies to the cause. Thus, in addition to its helpful influence upon church members, the movement led to the reformation of hundreds of nonbelievers.
In 1889 a class was formed at the sanitarium to study health and temperance subjects; and from this class, which held winter sessions for several years, a number of efficient lecturers, teachers, and workers in other departments of the work went out under the auspices of the American Health and Temperance Association.
The association continued its activities until 1893, when it was merged into the Seventh-day Adventist Medical Missionary and Benevolent Association, which included the purposes of its predecessor, but represented a far broader field of endeavor.