MORE ABOUT THE PROHIBITION "VICTORY" IN MAINE.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 14188, 31 October 1911, Page 8

MORE ABOUT THE PROHIBITION "VICTORY" IN MAINE.

(Reprinted from "Daily Telegraph," September 12th, 1911.)

MAINE LIQUOR LAW.

POPULAR VOTE FOR REPEAL

(From Our Correspondent.)

NEW YORK, September 12.

After sixty years of prohibition, the State of Maine yesterday voted for the repeal of the constitutional enactment prohibiting the manufacture or sale of intoxicants within the State. The result of the vote stands:—6o,Bo7 "Wets," or anti-prohibitionists, against 60,186 "Drys," ' or prohibitionists. Eight small towns are yet to be heard from, but it is not expected that any change will result.

(JThus by the narrowest majority Maine's unique boast that two generations have grown to manhood in the State without seeing a single public bar no longer holds.

Th© Legislature will proceed immediately .to enact legislation permitting public-houses to conduct business under the State licence. Several times since 1851, when the first anti-liquor law was adopted, it has been strengthened by th© popular vote. Tlie last occasion was in 1884, when the vote stood 70.783 for the continuance of the prohibition to 23,811 against. The result now announced is, therefore, a surprising change of public sentiment, and is due largely to the feeling that prohibition legislation is a great breeder of hypocrisy.

Although intoxicants could not publicly be sold, anybody wanting liquor could obttin it secretly without difficulty. Hiding places known as "casies" and "blind tigers" are located everywhere throughout the State where any kind of liquor is obtainable by thoso known to the proprietors as "safe." Theso drinks were poor in quality, and often greatly adulterated, which fact had a great influenoe on yesterday's voting.

Besides these secret public-houses, numerous "patent medicines" are sold by Main© chemists which ar© nothing but whisky and brandy. One excellent brand of Scotch whisky is sold as hair restorer.

Points near Cam-ida and Now Hampshire are frequently used for crossing tho boundary by Maine citizens in search of intoxicants, and it has long been a notorious sight to witness returning revellers. _ One Sunday morning train to Canada is known throughout the Stato as the "grand drunk" train. Theso facts led many temperance advocates to conclude that the enforcement of prohibition by law has broken down, and that the system developed \Prreater evils than those it cured. Maine, therefore, will revert to the high licence, and a strict supervision in the future of its drink trade. 0