The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1885.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 121, 30 May 1885, Page 2

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1885.

For th. came that lacks aislstanoa, For th* wrong that needa reelatano*, For th* futuro In th* -stanco, And tha good that w* can da,

New Zealand is at present the only colony of the Australasian group that enjoys the privilege of a Local Option law, and therefore, in respect to a liberal measure of self-government, her people may be said .to be leading the van in this part of the world. Agitation for a similar law has been carried on more or less fitfully in some of the Australian colonies, and just now a movement in favour of Local Option, is being pressed forward by the temperance party in Victoria. The Melbourne " Age," alluding to this movement with approval, points out that " only the other day the City Coroner stated that during the four months of this year he had held some 130 inquests, and in nearly every case the cause of death was due, either directly or indirectly, to intoxicating drink, while the consumption of beer alone in Victoria is equal to 80 gallons for every family in the land, reckoning five individuals to a family." Agitations for reform almost invariably spring out of gross and flagrant abuses. If the liquor traffic had been well conducted, with obedience and respect for moderate laws, we should have heard nothing of repression. Canada, in common with New Zealand, has a Local Option law, and public opinion there appears to be warmly in favour of tlie innovation. A special Commission was sent by the Canadian Government recently to inquire into the operation and effect of the Maine liquor law, and has reported most favourably on the subject; and this testimony is rendered more striking by the fact that one of the two Commissioners, prior to his visit, was strongly opposed lo the law. A resolution passed by the Canadian Senate declared

—"That the report of the Government Commission shows clearly that the prohibitory law of the States of Maine and Vermont has been well enforced, and has largely diminished crime and pauperism, and that its beneficial effects upon tl.e community have been so Cully proved by the experience of over twenty years that there is now no attempt made to repeal it; while in the other States visited—although the law was not so generally enforced—whcreever it was brought into operation the same result of diminution of crime followed. In cases where the prohibitory law was for a short time repealed, intemperance and crime immediately increased in so marked a degree that prohibition was soon re-enacted." Following this declaration a very stringent Act was passed, and is now in operation in the Dominion. In New Zealand we have as yet no thought of totally prohibiting the sale or manufacture of intoxicants, and the proper regulation of the sale gives the best security for the continuance of public support to the carrying on of a legitimate traffic under proper suporvisicn. A very small minority of the population would be found favourable to prohibiting a well-regulated sale, and driving the people into sly grog shops, and other infamous resorts, for drink. The existing law, although in need of amendment, and productive of anomalies in working, has undoubtedly improved the character of the trade, and it depends upon the moderation of those who administer the Act whether they retain public confidence. They assuredly will not find the people with them in any arbitrary measures. The best security against this, probably, is the sense of moderation and fair play which pervades an English community. From the tendency of legislation in other countries, however, it is evident that the people, having once taken the regulation of the trade into their own hands, will never relinquish it, and that accepting the inevitable, the best policy is to bring the liquor sale into conformity with public opinion, to abate any abuses, and render ihe Act as broad as possible. An agreeable feature in the. past administration of the law is that its working has not produced those deadly feuds and aggravated bitternesses between teetotallers and publicans which its opponents foretold • on the contrary, the temperance people and the Licensed Victuallers were never on better terms than they are at present. That this feeling may be preserved will depend upon the sense of justice exhibited by the licensing benches, and the proof they afford that they have not been unduly elated by past successes.