TEMPERANCE TRUTHS.

Press, Volume LVI, Issue 10481, 20 October 1899, Page 2

TEMPERANCE TRUTHS.

9' (Published by arrangement.) THE TESTIMONY AS TO THE BENEFITS OF "NO LICENSE" OF REV. E. ABBOT, D.D., Rector of St. James', Cambridge, Mass.; Editor of the "Literary World," Boston: Brother of Dr. Lyman Abbot. "The Doctor, on being interviewed in Chnistchurch on March 16th, 1899; said he was not personally a total abstainer, though strongly opposed to the open drin_ing bars, and he did not regard the drinking of alcohol as a sin. Tlie liberty of an individual to drink might have to bend to the consideration of the danger facilities for drinking imposed upon the community. He was a warm advocate of th© principle,. of local option, but perhaps -logically opposed the extension of the principle to a State or country. "About twelve years since, the war on the drink traffic in Cambridge was begun, as the outgrowth of a bigger movement to create moral force in municipal politics, and to save their city from the troubles which had visited New York. It was largely a church movement, the Rev. Dr. Breach, Congrega-tion-list, being one of the chief movers in the m_hter. '.Tihe Rev. Father Scully, of the Roman Catholic Chucb, had constantly supported them, and the six Episcopalian clergymen of the city, and ail other ministers, annually signed the appeal which was issued to the citizens. Twelve years ago, the citizens, by a small majority, abolished every form of liquor license, except for registered sales by chemists. Since then, an annual poll on the question of license or no license had been taken, always with a majority for no Hcense, though i__t majority fluctuated; but in 1897 it took a prodigious leap. They attributed this to the fact that young people taught in the schools during the preceding dozen years the physiologic-1 effects of alcohol had leached the voting age. He believed that Cambridge on this question woidd never go back. The fhcreased savings of the people, the greater value of properties, the decrease of crime, and the er_mnced safety of women and C-_dren_ made it impossible for any impartial man to doubt that Cambridge had immensely benefited by the abolition of -benses. "_here was considerable 'leakage.' Slygrog shops, which, were there called 'kitchen bars,' were run by loose women in the lower quarters of the city, but the police were vigilant, and the penaities were severe. The whole 'Boston border,' the line between Cambridge and Boston (where a license system prevailed), was fringed with saloons, so that men got drunk in Boston and were arrested in Cambridge, causing the statistics of arrests for drunkenness to be misleading. The system of sales by chemists was undoubtedly abused, bub the police regularly inspected the chem-.-ta' registers, and checked the abuse as far as possible. "It was wholly untrue to say that prohibition was a failure in Cambridge. He had not the figures with him, but property ' had increased very greatly in value under no license, while it had actually decreased during the ten years preceding the reform. Business had greatly improved, the savings of the people had largely increased, and, above all, the moral tone of the city had been raised beyond the most sanguine expectations of those who promoted the reform." Those who wish for further proof should write to Dr. Abbot; and, nearer home, his New Zealand host, Rev. R. A. Woodthorpe, of A_hb_rtan, who visited Dr. Abbot in Cambridge, would probably be willing to certify that the Doctor spoke more strongly than this leaflet reports. 123