AN IDEAL COUNTRY.

Press, Volume LVI, Issue 10541, 15 September 1899, Page 3

AN IDEAL COUNTRY.

In his address at the Choral Hall on Tuesday last, Mr J. Malms, 1.5. T., 1.0. G.T., which being ijrterpreted signifies Inier! national Supreme Templar of the Independent Order of Good Templars, eulogised New Zealand as "an ideal country, the freest in the world, a country freer than any republic, a country where the English wore more English and tihe Scotch more Scotch than they were in their own countries." If this be true—and who would dare impeach so august un authority—it will surely strike most people as being somewhat remarkable that New 2ea___id»__ should be asked to imitate countries less free and impose upon theniselves restrict-oiis destroying the very liberty which lifts -heir native land into"* the enviable posit-on of ideal territory. Canada encroached upon her liberties with pi-ohibitory enactments, and became sick and disgusted with the results. Seventeen States of the A-nerican Union adopted pro-hib-tio-i, and ten of them have wiped it from their Statute Books as a useless and pernicious interference with the people's liberties,- until to-day it remains in force in the lesser populated and least progressive of the Staibea -only. Without prohibition, New Zealand, according to the supreme authority of the gi-eatest prohibitory, organisation in the world, is "an ideal country." Should New Zealanders risk their present proud position of the freest people in the world by curtailing their liberty, impeaching their self-respect and denying their power of self-control, by enforcing a law which does not prevent drunkenness, but which does foster vices as detrimental to individual morality as they' are fatal to an ideal country.