03.08. Can the Liquor Traffic Be Restrained By a Prohibitory Law?

Can the Liquor Traffic Be Restrained
By a Prohibitory Law?

I MUST notice the arguments in the negative. Unreasonable as they may seem to us, there are those who regard them as being of importance.

1. Humanity will do about so much wrong any way; and if the waywardness were not in the way of drinking, it would be in opium-eating, or some other indulgence quite as injurious. Hence, if we could suppress the traffic, no particular good. would thereby be accomplished. Our answer to this is that there is no such a law in human nature as that which has been assumed. Humanity is not bound by any law to commit a given amount of folly and crime. Hence, removing one sin does not simply make room for another. But, on the other hand, every evil that fastens to us and fixes itself in our lives, renders us weaker and less able to stand against any other temptation to do wrong. The argument, then, is very unsound in its philosophy. Still further, it has been proven by undeniable facts, that sins and vices of all kinds disappear in the ratio of the diminution of liquor drinking. The following sta­tistics reveal the average facts: In 1837, the cases of murder and assault, with evil intent, in Ireland, amounted to 12,096. In the following year there were 11,058. In 1839, the number only reached 1,097. But, in 1840, the number of cases was reduced to 173. Why? During this time Father Mathew had induced 250,000 to sign the pledge of total abstinence.

Thus it appears that there was, with total absti­nence, only one case of crime to seventy without it. And yet the people were not all on the list. This would charge about ninety-eight percent of all their outrages up to the account of strong drink. There is, then, every reason why the traffic in alcoholic liquors should be abolished.

2. It is sometimes argued that no law prohibit­ing the sale of alcoholic liquors will ever be obeyed. But, we will see that it is as well-observed as any other law. Perhaps no law is perfectly kept, and yet there can be found no reason against the law on that account.

3. IN THE FACE OF ALL THE FACTS, MEN SOME­TIMES SAY THAT MORE LIQUOR WILL BE SOLD AND DRUNK UNDER A PROHIBITORY, THAN UNDER A LICENSE LAW!

I confess to a sense of shame when I realize that it is my duty to notice this nonsense. It is both unreasonable and diametrically opposed to all the facts in the case.

Everywhere, both in the Old World and in the New, where prohibition has had anything like a fair trial, it has worked well.

I presume that liquor men understand their interests in this matter. They are men of busi­ness shrewdness, and have no moral questions to occupy their attention. They give themselves wholly to the money phase of the question. If they could sell more liquor under a prohibitory, than under a license law, they would, every one of them, be in favor of prohibition. But what are the facts? Do they favor prohi­bition? Not a man of them. Why? But men say that the liquor, under prohibition, will not be sold by saloon keepers, but is smug­gled in, and that these men fight prohibition because it keeps them from doing, in a proper way, what the people will do any way. But the wholesale dealers would suffer nothing from a pro­hibitory law, for whoever ordered the liquors, they would be the merchants. And yet these wholesale liquor men are as bitterly opposed to prohibition as the saloon-keepers. The speeches made, papers read, and resolutions passed at the Brewers’ Congress, exhibit this very clearly. If, then, prohibition does not hinder the rum-trade, rum sellers are deplorably ignorant of the facts. I still hear, now and then, a second-rate simpleton mouthing over that superlative nonsense. Some of these may be thoughtless enough not to know any better, and are entitled to our pity, but it would be base flattery in most cases to call them fools.

We are authoritatively informed that the drink bill for Maine, 1877, was less than one-half mil­lion, whereas her quota of expenses would have been about twenty-seven millions. Before the pas­sage of the prohibitory law Maine drank more than her full share. Hence, it is a fact that pro­hibition is worth to Maine twenty-six millions per annum, without calculating any of the secondary expenses, of waste of time, mistakes in business, by reason of intoxication, criminal costs, pauper expenses, penitentiary pets, police force, etc., etc., which would multiply those figures by three. This is why Maine has suffered so little from the depres­sion in the money market. But they say, "You are not now to deal with Maine, but with Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, Illinois, Iowa, etc." I ask pardon, but I don’t see the point. Was Maine more easily managed than these? Why will not the same system that succeeded there suc­ceed here? I imagine that if the Maine law had been a failure that no man on that side would have made the discovery that a law, on this question, adapted to the wants of the people in that State, would not do in the West. Before the law was passed in Maine her people drank their full share of liquors. Now they only get about one-fifty-fourth of that amount. Are the people there more easily controlled than we are out here?

Maine has not many large towns, and on that account has less perverse humanity to deal with in the lump than Massachusetts, or even the West­ern States mentioned already. But her northern latitude more than makes up for this, as the people in the North are much more inclined to the use of alcoholic stimulants than those in the South. All observing travelers and statisticians are agreed in this. Besides, the employment of a great number of her men was in the forests and in lumbering. Those acquainted with the lumbering regions will agree with me that men in that business are most difficult to control, with respect to strong drink. We have no classes of men in the West as hard to manage as they. And yet the work has been accomplished in a quarter of a century, by pro­hibition, that two centuries of moral persuasion and license law would not have done. About the efficiency of the Maine law, then, there remains no doubt. When it began its career, it was, in this country, only a philosophy, but now it is an absolute demonstration. Listen to Neal Dow, while he tells how it succeeded:

"MAINE A CRUCIAL TEST.—Eleven clergymen of the city of Portland, representing seven distinct denom­inations, appended their names, in 1872, to a declara­tion, as follows: We say, without hesitation, that the trade in intoxicating liquors has been greatly reduced by it—the Maine law.

"In this city the quantity sold now is but a small fraction of what we remember the sales to have been, and we believe the results are the same, or nearly so, throughout the State. If the trade exists at all here, it is carried on with secrecy and caution, as other unlaw­ful practices are. All our people must agree that the benefits of this state of things are obvious and very great.

"The venerable Enoch Pond, Professor in the Bangor Theological Seminary, expresses his concurrence with the certificate heretofore given from the officials of that city.

"The pastors of Free Baptist churches in various parts of Maine, assembled at a Denominational Convention in Portland, in 1872, unanimously agreed to a declaration, ’That the liquor traffic is very greatly diminished under the representative power of the Maine law. It cannot be one tithe of what it was.’

"The census of 1870 gives us another glimpse at what the progressive enforcement of this law has done for Maine. Thus the number of persons convicted of crime in 1860, is given as 1,215, while, in 1870, the number had fallen to 431. So the number of paupers in 1860 was 8,946; in 1870, only 4,619.

"And the Overseers of the Poor in Portland, in 1872, united in the declaration: ’The favorable effect of this policy is very evident, particularly in the department of pauperism and crime. While the population of the city increases, pauperism and crime diminish, and in the department of police the number of arrests and com­mitments is very much less than formerly.’

"The editor of the Chicago Advance, the leading Congregational paper of the West, in 1874 wrote to prominent citizens of Maine for ’their opinion of the efficacy of the prohibitory law, formed from their per­sonal observation of its working.’ In publishing their replies in full, the Advance remarked: ’Their testimony is shaded according to individual acquaintance with the operations of the law, but will be found to agree for the most part in the main points of interest.’

"Most of the letters were from public men, whose testimony we have given. The most discouraging one is from the Rev. John O. Fiske, D.D., one of the most ’conservative’ of men, residing in Bath. This is a sea-faring community. According to this account, the law at that time had lax enforcement. He says: ’In the leading hotels the free sale of intoxicating liquor is notorious, at the same time that the proprietor of one of them has given his bond not to sell any. I often meet with drunken men in the streets, and there is no doubt that drinking alcoholic liquors in places of public sale, as well as private houses, is very common. What is true of Bath is true of many other places of equal importance in the State.’"

Yet, he goes on to say:

"The law is all that the best friends of temperance can desire; only there is wanting in many places the needed public sentiment properly to enforce it. In many small country places almost no liquor at all is sold by the glass; and this happy condition of things is attributed, whether with justice or not I cannot say, to the force of the prohibitory law.

"It seems to me to be very well and right to brand by law, as illegal and criminal, a traffic which is actually disgraceful and exceedingly dangerous. It is well at any rate to have good laws, and to prohibit what is so obviously and largely detrimental to the public interests, even if we cannot hope by such legal prohibition actu­ally and entirely to suppress it. I am inclined to think that the influence of the law, on the whole, is decidedly beneficial in helping to maintain a proper tone of public sentiment. The sale of liquors is kept out of sight as an illegal business, and probably less liquor is sold than would be if our system of prohibitory legislation was repealed.

"The testimony of clergymen has special significance only so far as they are accustomed to that kind of re­ligious work, which brings them to the homes of all their people. We close our evidence, therefore, with a letter from the rector of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Portland. It is evident that he knows whereof he affirms:

"PORTLAND, MAINE, June 4, 1872. " ’My Dear General:

"I was surprised to learn from you that the cause of temperance is damaged in England by an impression that it has been retarded here from the Maine law and similar enactments. That the contrary is true I feel sure, and am certain that it is, within the sphere of my observation for the past fifteen years. Many, in the humble classes of society particularly, have correct views, and form good resolutions, which they carry out successfully when not solicited to drink by the open bar. Many wives have assured me of the improved condition of their families through the greater restraints put upon their husbands. Families whose homes are in drinking neighborhoods, or in streets where formerly were many drunken brawls, have gratefully acknowl­edged the happy change wrought by the due adminis­tration of the law suppressing tippling-shops. To make^° this law a still greater blessing all that is needed is to enforce it as faithfully in the future as at the present time. Yours, truly, "A. DALTON.

"To Hon. Neal Dow."

UNITED STATES OFFICIAL STATISTICS. The United States Census Report for 1870, and the last Internal Revenue Report which I have at hand (1875), supply proof of a different kind, tending to the same result. Let us compare Maine with two other States under license laws, one in New England and the other in the Middle States, and selected not as the worst of their class, but as nearly related in population:

Maine, population, 626,915; distilleries, 1; brew­eries, 3; retailers, 842; liquor revenue, $49,237.77.

Connecticut, population, 537,454; distilleries, 68; breweries, 23; retailers, 3,353; liquor revenue, $336,743.49.

Maryland, population, 780,894; distilleries, 43; breweries, 65; retailers, 4,285; liquor revenue, $1,285,700.15. The number of retailers in Maine, of course, includes the town agencies.

These sums are the aggregate liquor revenue of all revenue collections on spirits and fermented liquors, as given in Report for 1874, pp. 78, 79. To all this weight of evidence of various kinds, I should have said, until recently, that Mr. Mur­ray, the British Consul, stands opposed. For he has been annually writing to his Government upon the strength of the police reports of Portland, which, as it is a seaport town, where the law has been variously and spasmodically enforced, show a considerable, number of arrests for drunk­enness, that "the Maine law is a failure." But I learn from an English paper that his report for 1875 contains this important admission: "As regards the town and village, there can be no manner of doubt that the law has been nearly successful."

Well, if that were all, the towns and villages, the homes of the major part of the people, and the nurseries of all that is ultimately great and powerful in the cities, were well worth the saving. But we have seen that the law is not without beneficent action in the cities. In view of what has been accomplished since the testimony above given was obtained, and of the recent action under the more stringent penal­ties of the law of 1877, it will seem to our friends in Maine proper to make an under-statement of their present condition. From the testimony we have now adduced, it would seem that the ’Committee on the Judiciary’ of the House of Representatives of the United States were justified in saying in their Report upon the Commission of Inquiry, made in January, 1874, through their chairman, Judge Poland, as follows:

"For a considerable number of years the general opinion of those most interested to break up and sup­press the use of intoxicating drinks has been that the only sure and effectual mode was by prohibiting their manufacture and sale, and thus cut off the means of supply of those disposed to drink. In many of the States such laws have been passed, and more or less, rigidly enforced. That they have ever been, or ever will be, enforced so strictly that no intoxicating liquors will be used, probably no one believes or expects; but that their effect has been greatly to lessen the consump­tion in all the States having such laws, the committee believes will be conceded by every candid man living in such States. It is often asserted that the use of liquor has increased in such States; but the allegation is uni­formly found to come from persons who are hostile to a prohibitory law."

Someone says that it is also a fact that the Maine law has not succeeded in other States. The only reason is, that it has not been adopted and kept before the people. It has only been adopted in part in other States, and then usually without provision for its enforcement. But just to the extent that prohibition has had a real place in any code, the drunkard-making traffic has disappeared. We have no right to argue that, because a feeble law on the subject has not put down the rum-power in any given State, there is, therefore, no power in a sensible law, with proper measures for its enforcement.

I will just call attention, then, to the "revenue on spirits in 1873:"    

Now, let it be remembered that the prohibitory laws of Massachusetts and New Hampshire are a long ways from perfection, and then we will begin to see what the effect of such laws are. Let us balance two States, Maine and Maryland. Mary­land had by a few thousand the larger population, and paid in revenue $1,084,396.40 under license, while Maine, under prohibition, with almost the same population, paid $81,114.80, or about one-thirteenth of the amount, according to her num­bers, that was paid by Maryland.

Ordinary common sense ought to be sufficient to teach any man that a prohibitory law with any power of enforcement at all, would prevent, to a very great extent, the sale and use of intoxicating beverages. Rum-sellers themselves know this; and hence they use every possible means to prevent the enactment of such laws. And I am fully convinced that the facts will bear me out in this mild statement, that even imperfect as such laws have been, and as feebly as they have been enforced, they have reduced the sale and use of intoxicants, where they have been tried, seventy-five per cent: below what has obtained in those States where the traffic has been licensed, and that crime in general has been abated in the same ratio.

I. SOME STATES HAVE RETURNED FROM PROHIBITION TO LICENSE. The people of Massachusetts are frequently cited as favoring license, after having found by experiment that prohibition in that State could not be enforced. That a man in favor of the rum-trade should present this as containing something akin to an argument is not strange, but that any temperance man should suffer himself to be deluded by such false logic and false statements is unreasonable.

If the people of Massachusetts ever did vote for a license, that would not prove that the license was better adapted to remove drunkenness than prohibition, for two reasons: first, the people may have preferred the opportunities for intemperance, and voted for license in order to secure them; second, if they wanted temperance and voted for license, it may have been because of an error in judgment. Hence, if it could be proven that the people of that State voted to return to license, and that they did it with the view of promoting the interests of the temperance cause, as they have not yet been proven to be infallible in judg­ment, there could be nothing gained except the merest shadow of an argument. Every fluctuation on any political question could as well be employed as an argument as this. And yet it is not a fact that the people of Mas­sachusetts voted for license after having tried pro­hibition. The people voted with their parties in the election of a Legislature. Those favoring rum voted with the party most favorable to their wishes. But the temperance men, as usual, suffered them­selves to be driven into their old party lines, and in this way the rum-power elected a license Legis­lature, which repealed the law. If we find that State in an unsettled condition, it says nothing as to the profitableness of prohibition; that must be learned from proper statistics. We must then appeal to the records, and not to a change in pol­itics, or the fickleness of a people, to know which of these systems of law has succeeded the better in preventing drunkenness and the crime conse­quent thereupon. I will quote a little authority on that subject. The law was first enacted in 1852 It was subject to many changes; sometimes it was strong, at other times it had less vital power, till 1865, when the State police regulation was enacted. This was a feature of efficiency that threatened the rum-trade with sudden extermination. The constable of the Commonwealth made this report:

"Up to the 6th of November, 1867, there was not an open bar known in the entire State, and the open retail liquor traffic had almost entirely ceased. The traffic, as such, had generally secluded itself to such an extent that it was no longer a public, open offense, and no longer an inviting temptation to the passer-by."

Dr. James B. Dunn gives his observations as follows:

"During the year 1867 we made several thorough examinations of Boston to see how the law worked. In North Street we counted fifty-six closed stores, with the significant words, ’To let,’ on the shutters, while in the other places where liquor had formerly been sold, honest and lawful business was carried on. In those dark and narrow streets of ’The North End,’ once crowded with throngs of thieves, harlots, and the most degraded wretches—where the dram-shops, dancing saloons and houses of prostitution pushed their nefarious trade—now quietness and sobriety reigned. In one night, during the month of May, we visited, between the hours of nine and twelve, many of the liquor, dancing and gambling saloons on Brattle, North, Commercial, Hanover, Union, Portland, Sudbury, Court, Howard, Fleet, Clark and Friend Streets, and in no place was there seen, nor could there be openly bought, one glass of intoxicating drink.

"On another occasion, we visited, in the evening, principal hotels - such as Parker’s, Tremont, Amer­ican and Young’s, and there found the same state of things to exist—bar-rooms empty, some of them closed—and where they were open, this significant notice was hung up, ’No liquors sold over this bar.’ "

But, in the fall of 1867, the election came off which resulted in favor of the liquor interest, and in the next four months there were 2,779 new liquor shops opened. In 1869 prohibition carried again in the Legislature, but the law was feeble till 1873. This law was again defeated by the election in the fall of 1874. But of the results of that year, while they had prohibition, Louis Shade, the Special Agent of the Brewers’ Congress, says:

"Had our friends in Massachusetts been free to carry on their business, and had not the State authorities con­stantly interfered, there is no doubt that, instead of showing a decrease of 116,585 barrels in one year, they would have increased at the same rate as they did the preceding year."

Testimony may be had to any amount that the prohibitory law in Massachusetts was enforced as well as any other law on her statutes. Sometimes, as we have said, the form of it was very weak, and its enforcement was attended with very meager results; but when it had its proper form it suc­ceeded in reducing the sale of liquors to a mere nominal amount, and removed about seven-tenths of the crime.

What, then, if the law has been several times repealed, and as many times re-enacted? We know that the law was holy and good, and was attended with the very best of results. Of course the num­ber of large towns in that State, and the immense numbers of foreigners of the lowest order, make it one of the most difficult States to manage, on the liquor question, in the Union. Legislators are bought and sold by the wholesale liquor men, when they can find them on the market, and they employ every advantage that money will procure by which license shall be caused to prevail. So far, then, as Massachusetts testifies on this subject, prohibition is both desirable and possible. Is it said that the State derived a revenue from the license law? The State Auditor reports the revenue thus: Liquor licenses, $118,200; tax on sales of liquors, $15,773.05; confiscated liquors, $3,858.92. Total, $137,831.97. A paltry amount! This money will not pay the current expenses of the courts in the State, which were, in 1868, $193,569.38. It is only one-third the amount of the State "charitable" expenses in 1868, as reported by the Auditor—$426,459.82—"four-­fifths" of which, as we have seen, was occasioned by intemperance. Four fifths of $426,459.82 is $321,167.84. More than double the amount of the revenue! And this is but one item. We can find hundreds of families in the State, neither one of whom would accept that paltry revenue in lieu’ of the prosperity and happiness with which they parted under the effects of the license law!

INFLUENCE OF BOSTON To appreciate the influence of Boston, we must see what Boston is. She was doubly cursed by the license law. For the last quarter of 1868, the Chief of Police reported—

Number of Arrests5,596 Number of Lodgers7,617 Total13,213 For the corresponding quarter of 1867, the year of enforced prohibition, the Chief reported—

Number of Arrests1,530 Number of Lodgers2,617 Total4,147

Over nine thousand more, in a single quarter, under license than under prohibition! Or, deduct­ing 617 arrests and lodgers in Roxbury, which was annexed to Boston in 1867, there is a net increase of 8,449 persons under license. Lodgers are counted by police officers as the victims of the liquor traffic.

Comparing the preceding quarter of 1868 (from July 1st to October 1st), with the corresponding quarter of 1867, with reference to those offenses which are the direct results of rum-selling, and we have the following:

In whatever way we compare statistics, the result, is a decided rebuke to license. Nor should one fact be overlooked. In 1867, when the State police were enforcing the prohibitory law in Boston, the city police were engaged in arresting every person who was at all disguised with liquor, in order to increase the number of arrests for drunkenness, and make it appear that prohibition increased intemperance. On the other hand, in 1868, under license, the city police made no special effort to increase the number of arrests for drunkenness; nor could they arrest a drunken person without a warrant, under license, while they could under the prohibitory law. This fact shows how much more vigilant the city police were in 1867 than in 1868; and yet the Chief’s own figures, notwithstanding this conniving and effort against prohibition, show remarkable results in favor of it! The Chief reported 2,052 liquor shops in Bos­ton in 1868, with their usual accompaniment of gambling hells and houses of ill-fame. Of the latter he reports—

Number of houses123 Assignation only49 Houses keeping girls73

All of these existing in defiance of law, with four hundred commissioned policemen standing power­less in their presence, and reporting their inefficiency to the Commonwealth by announcing the number of these dens of infamy which they know exist! Gambling and prostitution usually increase with grog-shops. With rum-selling, they consti­tute that infernal trio of corruption on which Satan depends for the management of great cities.

Rev. George P. Wilson, of Lawrence, who has been a very successful city missionary for twelve years, says, in his report of April 4th, 1869:

"The city of Lawrence has never been so entirely given over to this demon of drink as during the last year. This I confidently assert from personal obser­vation, in the street, at the homes of the poor, and in the prison. Every one can see the increase of tippling shops in the most conspicuous places, boldly, as never before, advertising their nefarious traffic. And, secondly, never have there been seen in the same length of time so many drunken persons on our public streets. Thirdly, never were so many young people learning the soul-destroying habit of moderate drinking. This can be seen by anyone who will notice the public saloons. This we consider the worst feature of the new order of things; this making of drunkards by the increased temptations furnished by the multitudes of open bars, showing our children what has not been seen in Law­rence before for over sixteen years. Fourth, never in any year have we heard so many complaints from wives and mothers of the ruin of their homes through intemperance. Fifth, never have we seen so much neglect of husbands toward their wives, wives and parents toward their children. Many of the stories of cruelty and suffering have pained my heart more than I can express. Oh, these poor sufferers, have they no claim upon us? I speak for those who cannot speak for themselves, the poor, helpless, hungry, naked chil­dren, the heart-broken wives and mothers, the poor slaves of the cup who would break away, but cannot, amid the fearful and wicked temptations now shielded by law."

Rev. Horatio Wood, of Lowell, who retired from missionary work in that city, January 1, 1869, after his long and faithful service of twenty-four years, speaks thus in his last report:

"I said last year that I could not but regard the attempt to revive among us the discarded license law as ’the coming of a dark day for the interests and pros­pects of the suffering and perishing classes.’ The fore­thought proved correct. The enactment of the law caused at once a large increase of the sale and drinking of intoxicating liquors. In September it was reported on good authority that the last year there were 873 engaged in the liquor traffic in Suffolk County; this year 2,300. At the House of Correction, in East Cam­bridge, the increase of inmates has been as follows. There were committed for drunkenness —

"In Lowell, it is well known that liquor shops have multiplied in our streets, and are more freely visited; that more come out of them staggering, or helped along to places of privacy; and that our young men, our hope, are the most frequent victims of unprincipled and cruel mammon. I know that many among the poor drink twice where they drank once, and some five times where once; that the earnings in many a poor family go more for drink, to line the pockets of men of prey, or to uphold others in laziness and rioting, while the families are more than ever screwed out of a living, and prevented from a decent appearance in society. I know that many wives have worse husbands, and many hus­bands worse wives this year than last; many children more cruel fathers and more indifferent mothers, estrang­ing them to their ruin. I know—but why need I declare further? All know enough to convince them, if they will but think and reflect, that a mighty evil is increas­ing among us." That the burden of taxation increases with the growth of pauperism and crime is evident from the following fact: The town of Vineland, New Jersey, was incorporated and built up as a temper­ance town. No land can be sold except in small lots, and to actual settlers, and the purchaser for­feits his land by the sale of liquor on it. The overseer of the poor, T.T. Curtis, Esq., says in his last report:

"Though we have a population of ten thousand peo­ple, for the period of six months no settler or citizen of Vineland has required relief at my hands, as overseer of the poor. Within seventy days there has only been one case among what we call the floating population, at the expense of $4.

"During the entire year there has only been one indictment, and that a trifling case of assault and bat­tery among our colored population.

"So few are the fires in Vineland that we have no need of a fire department. There has only been one house burnt down in a year, and two slight fires, which were soon put out.

"We practically have no debt, and our taxes are only one percent on the valuation.

"The police expenses of Vineland amount to $75 per year, the sum paid to me; and our poor expenses a mere trifle.

"I ascribe this remarkable state of things, so nearly approaching the golden age, to the industry of our people and the absence of King Alcohol.

"Let me give you, in contrast to this, the state of things in the town from which I came, in New England. The population of the town was nine thousand five hun­dred a little less than that of Vineland. It maintained forty liquor-shops. These kept busy a police judge, city marshal, assistant marshal, four night watchmen, and six policemen. Fires were almost continual. That small place maintained a paid fire department of four com­panies, of forty men each, at an expense of $3,000 per annum. I belonged to this department for six years, and the fires averaged about one every two weeks, and mostly incendiary. The support of the poor cost $2,500 per annum. The debt of the township was $120,000. The condition of things in this New England town is as favorable in that country as that of many other places where liquor is sold."

Governor Washburn, in his annual message to the Legislature in 1874, said:

"Some honest reformers may urge the fact that the present law is not thoroughly enforced in our large cities as a reason for its repeal and the substitution of a license law in its stead. But shall we repeal the laws against gambling, prostitution, pocket-picking, and burglary, simply because they cannot be thoroughly enforced in densely populated localities? This would be equivalent to saying that we will not have any laws that are unpalatable to the worst classes in our cities. It would be sacrificing the State to the city; it would be leveling downward rather than upward. Furthermore, the idea that a license law would be efficiently admin­istered through local agencies is a delusion and a snare. The experiment has been tried again and again. But did the authorities of these same large cities ever show any greater anxiety to enforce a license law than they now do to enforce the existing prohibitory statute? The friends of this statute may safely challenge its opponents to the record."

Hon. Thomas Talbot, in his message vetoing the Liquor License Bill, in January, 1874, said:

"The history of the struggle with the evils of intem­perance is most instructive. The earliest attempts to check the use of intoxicating liquors were in the direc­tion of license and regulation. These attempts continued in the Commonwealth for more than two hundred years, with a constantly increasing stringency, which can only be explained on the ground that mild measures were found to be insufficient, until, in 1855, the experiment was determined upon of adopting prohibition, as the only logical and effective method of dealing with the matter. Without asserting that this has proved so suc­cessful in overcoming the evils it was meant to remedy as was hoped by those who initiated and those who sustain the prohibitory policy, I am fully of the opinion that more progress has been made toward the desired end than was ever before made in the same period under any other system. In considering what has been accomplished, we must recognize the great changes that have taken place since this system was inaugurated.

"I am aware that it is said intemperance increases under our prohibitory law that the sale of intoxicants is as great as it would be under a license law. But I call your attention to the absence here of the flaunting and attractive bar-rooms, that spread their snares to capture the thoughtless and easily-tempted in cities where licenses prevail; to the constantly growing sense of disfavor with which the liquor traffic is regarded by the country generally; and to the powerful, systematic, and unrelenting activity of those interested in it to break down the law and the officers who try to enforce it. Here is an evidence that the statute does impose an active and crippling restraint, from which relief is sought in the elastic and easily-evolved providence of license."

George Marston, district attorney for the South­ern District, said:

"There can be no doubt that the enforcement of the law decreases crime. No other logical result can be reached. As intoxication is the cause of a large majority of the crimes that are committed, it follows, of course, when the sale of intoxicating liquor can be suppressed or repressed, crime will decrease. Experience shows that practical result; when the law is most fully enforced crime has decreased."

John B. Goodrich, district attorney for Middle­sex County, said:

"Generally, the strict enforce­ment of the law largely reduces the business of the courts."

Major Jones, formerly Chief of State Police, said:

"The law is as well enforced generally through the State as any other law; but in Boston the liquor sellers and dealers spend money freely, and are well organized. There are about three hundred and sixty towns, and in three hundred of them the law is well enforced, and it exercises an influence upon the others."

General B.F. Butler said:

"This law was en­forced in all the cities and towns, with the excep­tion of a few of the larger cities, as much and as generally as the laws against larceny." The city marshal of Worcester testifies that drunkenness decreased forty percent in that city in one year under the prohibitory law.

Oliver Ames & Sons, North Easton, say:

"We have over four hundred men in our works here. We find that the present license law has a very bad effect among our employees.

"We find on comparing our production in May and June of this year (1868) with that of the corresponding months of last year (1867), that in 1867, with 375 men, we produced eight percent more goods than we did in the same months in 1868 with 400 men. We attribute this falling-off entirely to the repeal of the prohibitory law, and the great increase in the use of intoxicating liquors among our men in consequence."

I have been thus particular in furnishing evi­dence respecting the work of prohibition in Mas­sachusetts because, since the last return to license, those who favor the traffic in alcoholic liquors have paraded the lapse as an evidence of the in­utility of the law in that State. The fact of the success in Maine is generally admitted. But they would find that it is because Maine has no large towns, and but little of the foreign beer element recently imported into the country. Hence, though Maine may be benefited by the law, there is no evidence that other States, containing an entirely different element, would be improved by such a law. But we have now seen from every possible source that Massachusetts, when she was under a proper law, with proper provisions for the enforce­ment of the law, was as thoroughly controlled as was Maine. This was the cause of the effort to repeal the law, which, by the aid of the political machinery of which we have spoken, succeeded; not because the people desired the repeal, but be­cause temperance men held to their parties; thus giving the balance of power to the liquor interest.

I quote the following from "Prohibition Does Prohibit," by J.N. Stearns, respecting:

VERMONT Governor Peck, Judge of the Supreme Court, said:

"In some parts of the State there has been a laxity in enforcing it, but in other parts of the State it has been thoroughly enforced, and there it has driven the traffic out. I think the influence of the law has been salutary in diminishing drunkenness and disorders arising there­from, and also crimes generally. You cannot change the habits of a people momentarily. The law has had an effect upon our customs, and has done away with that of treating and promiscuous drinking. The law has been aided by moral means, but moral means have also been wonderfully strengthened by the law.

"I think the law is educating the people, and that a much larger number now support it than when it was adopted; in fact, the opposition is dying out. All the changes in the law have been in the direction of greater stringency. In attending court for ten years I do not remember to have seen a drunken man."

Governor Conyers said:

"The prohibitory law has been in force about twenty-two years. The enforcement has been uniform in the State since its enactment, and I consider it a very desirable law. I think the law itself educates and advances public sentiment in favor of temperance. There is no question about the decrease in the consumption of liquor. I speak from personal knowledge, having always lived in the State. I live in Woodstock, sixty miles from here, and there no man, having the least regard for himself, would admit selling rum, even though no penalty at­tached to it."

W.B. Arcourt, Associate Justice for Washing­ton County, said:

"Public sentiment is growing stronger in favor of the law every year."

CONNECTICUT Has had some experience in prohibition. Her Legislature adopted a prohibitory law in 1854 by a large majority. The next October Governor Dutton said:

"The law has been thoroughly executed, with much less difficulty and opposition than was expected. In no instance has a seizure produced any general excitement. Resistance to the law would be unpopular, and it has been found in vain to set it at defiance." In his Message in 1855, he said:

"There is scarcely an open grog-shop in the State, the jails are fast becoming tenantless, and a delightful air of security is everywhere enjoyed."

Governor Miller, in 1856, said:

"From my own knowledge and from information from all parts of the State, I have reason to believe that the law has been enforced, and the daily traffic in liquors has been broken up and abolished."

Rev. W.G. Jones, of Hartford, in 1854, said:

"Crime has diminished at least seventy-five percent"

Rev. Mr. Bush, of Norwich, said:

"The jails and almshouses are almost empty."

Rev. David Hawley, city missionary of Hart­ford, said:

"That since the prohibitory law went into effect his mission school had increased more than one-third in number. The little children that used to run and hide from their fathers when they came home drunk are now well dressed and run out to meet them."

Mr. Alfred Andrews, of New Britain, said:

"This law is to us above all price or valuation. Vice, crime, rowdyism, and idleness are greatly diminished, while virtue, morality, and religion are greatly pro­moted."

Rev. R.H. Main, of Meriden, Chaplain of the Reform School, testified that "crime had dimin­ished seventy-five percent" In New London County the prison was empty and the jailers out of business. In New Haven the commitments to the city prison for crimes arising from intemperance, in July, 1854, under a license law, were 50; while in August, under prohibition, there were only 15. In the city workhouse there were 73 in July to 15 in August; making a balance of 92 in both institutions in one month in favor of prohibition.

Similar testimonies were received from all the principal towns in the State, giving the most unqualified approval of the law and admiration of its happy results.

Rev. Dr. Bacon, of New Haven, after the law had been in operation one year, said:

"The operation of the prohibitory law for one year is a matter of observation to all the inhabitants. Its effect in promoting peace, order, quiet, and general prosperity, no man can deny. Never for twenty years has our city been so quiet as under its action. It is no longer simply a question of temperance, but a govern­mental question—one of legislative foresight and mo­rality." The Legislature of 1873 repealed the law, how­ever, substituting license, and the official records show that crime increased 50 percent in one year under license. At a public hearing before the Legislative Com­mittee, in 1875, Rev. Mr. Walker, of Hartford, presented official returns showing that crime had increased four hundred percent in the city of Hartford since the prohibitory law was repealed. The report of the Secretary of State shows that there was a greater increase of crime in one year under license than in seven years under prohi­bition. The report says:

"The whole number of persons committed to jail during the year is 4,481, being 1,496 more than in the preceding year.

"The two counties most clamorous for license in 1872 show the greatest increase of the crime of drunk­enness in 1874. Hartford County has an increase of commitments for drunkenness of 115 percent, and New Haven County 141 percent. That is, Hartford County shows 215 commitments for drunkenness this year for every 100 made two years ago, and New Haven County shows 241 for every 100 of two years ago." Does someone say that Connecticut has repealed her prohibitory law and returned to license? She did; and again the same scheming by political managers, and the same blind adherence to party by temperance people has been exhibited that has everywhere been the bane of the cause of pro­hibition. In no State has the prohibitory liquor law been repealed because of inefficiency. But, on the con­trary, the liquor men have fought and continue to fight it because it does succeed in putting down their traffic. That these men have succeeded in carrying their purposes is attributable, not to any righteousness in their cause, nor to any failure in the law where it has had any provision for its en­forcement, but to their money and the corruption in political circles.