PROHIBITION COLUMN

Evening Star, Issue 19918, 14 July 1928, Page 18

PROHIBITION COLUMN

i t Published by Arrangement with the Inited Temperance Reform Council.] The liquor traffic is the most degrading, dangerous, destructive, and demoralising, physically, mentally, and spiritually, of all the businesses allowed in this dominion. Why continue it? A TIMBER MAN'S VIEWS Mil G. M. CORNWALL. “ Ono of tho most frequent questions I have been asked during my very delightful visit to New Zealand,” said Mr George M. Cornwall, editor of ‘ The Timberman,’ Portland, Oregon, who spent several days in Wellington, “is the result of Prohibition in tho United States.” Mr Cornwall stated:— “ I am very glad to say that the results obtained through Prohibition have been most helpful in tho development of tho country. • Tho subject must be considered very largely from a purely economic standpoint. Wo find that the great bulk of the money, amounting to millions of pounds, which formerly was spent for alcohol in U.S.A., has been diverted into the channels of industry, thus increasing the demand for, manufactured goods of every description and insuring steadier employment, to tho distinct advantage of the nation as a whole. Every student of economics realises that tho waste incidental to the liquor traffic levies a very heavy toll on physical efficiency and diverts the natural How of earnings into unproductive channels. In other words, capital invested in breweries or distilleries does not return to any country tho same measure of financial benefits which factories yield. STRONG SUPPORTERS. “The prosperity which the United States enjoys to-day is very largely attributable to the reduced volume of tho liquor traffic, and it is for this reason that great captains of industry, such as Judge Gary, of the United States Steel Corporation, Henry Ford, of Ford Motor Company, ami Captain Robert Dollar, tho largest single shipping operator in tho United States, and scores of other great industrial leaders, back tho Prohibition movement. Not only do these industrial leaders endorse Prohibition, but tho bulk of the working people who realise that a pound spent for a motor car is a better investment than a pound spent for whisky. In one case, they crave a pleasureable asset, and in the other, usually, only a headache. THE ECONOMIC ASPECT. “When this question of Prohibition is stripped ol every vestige of sentiment and treated purely as an economic question, there is no valid argument left for tho sponsors of alcohol, for, in tho final analysis, steady employment at remunerative wages, makes for contentment and higher social status. You can depend upon it that the advantages which the United States has obtained from tho diversion of the earnings of its people into productive industry will never be given up, as it gives her a distinct supremacy over other countries, which, the United States realises, and capitalises to the fullest advantage. EMPLOYMENT. “1 have not before mo the total amount of money spent in Great Britain, tho country of my birth, for alcohol, but it is a very great sum, running into hundreds of millions of pounds annually. I do know, however, that tho Government figures show over a million unemployed. It would not take a very brilliant mathematician to demonstrate that if a good share of this expenditure, was diverted into motor car production and home building, let us say, that the volume of additional labour which would bo created would in a very largo measure wipe out tho unemployment now menacing the prosperity of the British Empire, Tins has been tho experience of the United States. It is simply nonsense to talk of repealing the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which would require ratification by a two-thirds majority of tho Legislatures of the forty-eight States—-a condition which it is impossible to contemplate, It will be remembered that a number of tho States were already dry before the Eighteenth Amendment was adopted, and tho Federal enactment only accentuated tho growing popular demand for tho further curtailment of tho waste incidental to tho liquor traffic. “Prohibition in the United States is treated purely, as stated, ns an economic rather than an academic question, and has therefore succeeded, and is now beyond the realm of debate.” AN ADVANTAGE. “ In order to get a concrete idea of the advantage of Prohibition to the people in the United States, 1 may say that in my view the United States is 10 per cent, ahead of Great Britain in per capita production as tho result of Prohibition. A further 10 per cent, better off because of the money so saved being invested in productive enterprise, and a further 5 per cent, better off for other reasons, making a total advantage of 25 per cent, in favour of tho United States. Considered from tho standpoint of competition in world markets, this means that tho United States products can surmount a tariff barrier up to, say, 20 per cent., and then havo something to spare. GREAT BRITAIN. “ Great Britain will probably have a shock when she realises what are tho actual reasons for her falling trade, and in my view sho will havo to secure experts in mass production, and to carry certain social measures before sho can hold her own again. If, however, sho does that it is certain that tho United States would havo its work cut out to battle with British competition.” ’ . It may be of interest to mention that Mr Cornwall, although an American citizen, was born in Aberdeen, and so was,born a Britisher. Ho therefore feels himself able as one of tho family to speak frankly to British people. Show tho above to every business man yon know. ICELAND DRYS UNITE. A Prohibitionist Federation has recently been founded in Iceland, It includes tho Good Templars, tho Pastors’ Society, tho Teachers’ Society, that of tho women, tho Icelandic Sport Society, the Progressionist Party, tho Socialist Party. Other adhesions are expected, amongst them the Juvenile Societies Alliance of Iceland. As is well known, Iceland was obliged to yield to pressure on the part of Spain and to attenuate her Prohibition law. Note that in this country of about 100,000 inhabitants the Good Templar Order counts 7,276 members. SOME SARCASM. Mr A- J. Waterhouse, writing in a California journal entitled ‘As the World Wags,’ gives the following reasons for opposing prohibitory legislation : First.—Prohibition does not prohibit. It never docs, whether it apply to theft or drink, murder or booze, Second.—ln any event we should r.ot prohibit the use of beer and wine, for they make us drunk more slowly than distilled liquors do. Third.—Drinking really increases under Prohibition, and this is why all patriotic liquor sellers oppose it. I;know that I am right in these contentions, for I have not talked with a single distiller, brewer, or saloon keeper who did not agree with me.