This time of year, the papers are full of stories about the upcoming election and in 1910, the Ridgeway Journal was no different. There were at least eleven amendments on the ballot that year, but the most contentious item was Amendment 10 for the prohibition of the manufacture of alcoholic beverages except for medicinal or religious purposes. Rev. J. H. Burrows, a pastor in Cainsville, strongly endorsed the 10th amendment in an article in the October 27, 1910 edition of the Ridgeway Journal.
Burrows wrote this opinion at the end of his guest editorial urging voters to pass the 10th amendment: “If prohibition is beaten (God forbid) then the pendulum will swing backward into the shades of crime and lawlessness run riot. Reader, it is up to you, and for the first time in the history of this grand old commonwealth you have a chance to hit this traffic square on the head by putting prohibition into the organic law of Missouri. Will you do it? God grant that you may.”
Though Ridgeway voted to go “dry” by a nearly 2 to 1 margin, none of the eleven amendments on the ballot passed that year statewide. (Columbia Missouri Herald, Nov 11, 1910 and Ridgeway Journal, Nov 10, 1910.)
