"DRASTIC PROPOSALS"

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 76, 31 March 1939, Page 8

"DRASTIC PROPOSALS"

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—Ye gods! What a country! J could hardly believe what I read this evening in the report under the very apt heading "Drastic Proposals." For purposes of elucidation I will quote just a part of the Commissioner of Police's views:— "He moved that legislation should be drafted making it an offence for a person to take liquor in any quantity while in charge of a ear. ..." "Mr. M. F. Luekie: Where are we ! going to end? "Mr Cummings: - am not going to end anywhere. The legislation would make it an 'offence' for a driver to take any liquor and for anyone to supply him with any liquor." Well! Well! Because we have a few burglars and thieves we lock up the whole population in prison! Because one man buses alcohol, no one is allowed to have it if he drives a car. What logic! To carry it to an absurdity —which the motion implies—l daren't give an alcoholic drink to my guest at dinner if he should be so unfortunate as to have driven in his car to my house. If, to still further carry out the absurdity: every time a guest entered my house I should have to inquire if he came in a car before I asked him to partake, of an alcoholic drink. Ah, me! What a country! What a life! The Commissioner, • I feel sure, hasn't been into the subject thorough-' ly, or even he would roar with laugh-

ter at the' absurd situations. I hate, abominate, and detest a drunkard and a drunken driver as,much as he does, but the solution is futile and laughable. It comes to this: "Lock ap everyone in prison in case he may be a potential criminal." Restrictions of rights and privileges never got a community anywhere. Liberty and justice always succeed. To sum up: "You can't stop a dog barking, but at least you can train him to bark only when necessary." Killing the dog gets you nowhere; the other dog will do the same—ad infinitum. —I am, etc.,

MODERATION.