Prohibition and No-License.

Feilding Star, Volume XXIV, Issue 141, 13 December 1902, Page 2

Prohibition and No-License.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, — I crave your space to refer to Mr J. C. Thompson's letter. He says : " Many people imagine . . . that the No-license party aims at nothing less than the total prohibition of the importation, manufacture, sale, and consequently the consumption of all alcoholic drinks. This may have been the intention at one time, but it is not the purpose now. The present, and, I believe, th 6 ultimate object aimed at by the temperance reformers, is by no means so drastic or unreasonable." Without questioning the unreasonableness, I must question if the ultimate aims of the Temperance Party, as a Party, are one whit less drastic. In Tuesday's Advocate appeared a letter from the Rev D. Gordon, Marfcon. He says : " Perhaps I should say there is a great difference between Prohibition and No-license Prohibition stops all importation, manufacture, or sale of drink. That we cannot have at preseut. No-license simply closes bars in hotels, stops shouting, etc." Just so! Prohibition cannot be obtained at present, but is it not the aim of the Party '? 1 have beside me a leaflet, headed " The Great Experiment," extracted from the N.Z. Herald of September stb, 189G, and distributed by members of the Temperance party at the conclusion of a meeting held in the Drill Hall, Feilding, a few years ago, and at which Mr Isitt spoke. The leaflet says : "We are therefore, as we have said, on the eve of making one of the most remarkable, social, moral, and even physiological experiments known to history, and it is curious to consider what the results of the experiment may be. We assume that if tho experiment is made (prohibition) it will bo made effectively, and that those who may amuse themselves by intending to laugh at the law, will be brought to laugh with the wrong side of the mouth. If the people will it, the law can be made effective, and imprisonment without option, and with labour added if required, for every infraction of the Jaw, will soon clear the laud of whisky." Here we have the ultimate aim of tho Temperance Party, to clear the land of fermented liquor; and, also, we have the measure they propose to mete out to those opposed to them. Mr Thompson says : " The majority must always assert itself under any democratic form of government." If so, the majority should be certain that it represents the fighting strength of the democracy, as the " gentle methods " recommended by the leaflet I have quoted would probably load to organised resistance. If wo judge the Temperance Party by the utterances of its loaders and by its literature, we must conclude that its aim is Prohibition, Reduction and No-license being merely incidents on the way, and useful incidents too, in catching the votos of earnest people eager to reform the abuses of the liquor traffic : but it behoves alLsuch to remember that they are assisting a party whose aim is not reformation, and that the carrying of Prohibition would bring about a. worse state of affairs than at present exists. I am, etc., Geo. Wheeler. Feilding, December 13th.