EVILS OF NO-LICENSE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3390, 4 December 1911, Page 3

EVILS OF NO-LICENSE.

MR. W. D. LYSNAR’S VIEWS

SOMETHING ABOUT ITS “TESTIMONIALS.

(Continued from Saturday’s issue and published by arrangement.) “I notice the No-license people are very fond of getting up testimonials signed by people in no-license areas, as_ sorting that No-License lias benefited their town,” remarked Mr. W. D. Lysnar to an interviewer on Saturday. “Personally I attach very little credence to these testimonials.” It might be remembered, Mr. Lysnar pointed out, the No-License party did a similar thing here in Gisborne. They quoted a man who was stated to be a storekeeper at Balclutha, who did the largest business there. Ho (Mr Lysnar) had interviewed this gentleman, and also made inquiries about him. He found this man was a very strong prohibitionist, and ivais, and he believed is j still, doing the best business in Bal- j clutha. He had been charged by the j g police with sly-grog selling. When : charged he had said, “It was not me, it I I was the wife that sold it,” with the re- | {; suit that the wife was proceeded against ] and convicted. • This, Mr. Lysnar added, recalled an- 1 i other incident he had in a no-license district. He went into a shop to inquire the effect of No-license on their business. When he went in the shop was empty and he had to wait a little I while. When the woman who kept the *■ shop hurried in she gave him a friendly [ reception and said, “I hope I have not been keeping you long, sir. I have made up my mind to sell out and go elsewhere. This prohibition is a terrible , tiling. Things are getting worse in- ’ stead of better. I would like to get to some place where there is no prohibition.” He (Mr. Lysnar) replied, “Oh, that sounds bad for prohibition. I have just come here to find out how prohibition is affecting this place.” The woman became at once startled and said, ‘‘Oh, Lord, Sir, are you here about prohibition?” He (Mr Lysnar) replied, “Yes, I have come from Gisborne to try and find out how it affects you.” She said, j looking at him closely, "Why, I thought! you were somebody else.” (He, Mr. j Lysnar, presumed a commercial travel- | lev, who would perhaps know of’ a pro- j ba.ble purchaser of the business). By! this time ho had taken cut Iris note Irook j to note some of her statements, when ; she became terribly concerned, and beg- | ged of him not to make any note of it, | but if he did to say that she said prohi-1 bition was a good thing and that it enabled her to sell her lemonade and ginger beer. She also said that if some of the prohibition people heard she was giving information against prohibition it would ruin her. He (Mr. Lysnar) said: “Surely they will not do anything to you for telling the truth ?” Whereupon she replied, “Ah, you don’t know them, they are terrible people.” Then she added, “I have been in Gisborne, ! and yon don’t mean to tell me they are such fools as to have prohibition up j there?” He (Mr. Lysnar) replied: | “Well, we have some fools un there, j tire same as you had down here.” She j then said: “Well, Lord, sir, I thought 1 they would have more sense than that.” ; After such experience, Mr. Lysnar j continued, lie attached more importance ' to the statements of Magistrates who had experience in No-license districts. WHAT THE MAGISTRATES THINK, j They were invariably very strong against No-license. For instance. Mr It. j S. Hawkins, S.M., and Mr. H. A. Strat- j ford, S.M., the two magistrates who j have for the greater par t during no- I license Ireen magistrates at Balclutha. ! They were both very strong against | No-iicense. Then they had Mr. V. G. j Day, S.M., of Ashburton, well known in j this district, who was also very strong | on the subject. Then there was the ! late Mr. Northcroft, S.M., wlro was j magistrate in the King Country from j the inception of No-license until quite recently. It was the late Mr. North- j croft who, when asked the reason why j he was so strong against No-license, in- | formed him (Mr. Lysnar) that among j other reasons it detrimentally affected j the moral character. To illustrate this he told him of a case that had come before him where the police had been unsuccessful in getting evidence against a suspected sly-grog seller. They brought in a detective from outside, who was not known. He ingratiated himself j into the friendship of some of the local people, and was in due course invited into the sly-grog shop. There he was | asked what he would have. The land-| lady was present and pretended to be i shocked. She protested that they | could not get anything there as it was a no-license district. The friend said, “Oh. he’s all right. T will vouch for him.” With that the lady said, “What will you have, Haig and Haig or some other brand?” The detective replied lie would have Haig and Haig, and with that she pulled up her skirts and out of a big pocket in her petticoat pulled out a bottle of whisky, and served the detective. For that she was convicted and fined. Furthermore, Mr. Northcroft asserted that the man who was responsible for the King Country being declared a no-license district by legislation, and had himself been in Parliament, was three times convicted by Mr. Northcroft of sly-grog selling. On the third occasion the man regretted lie was unable to carry on business without sly. grog selling. DEGRADING EFFECT OF NOLICENSE. After having gone through the United States, I am satisfied that their disregard for law and order is the direct outcome of this no-license movement, and that if we in New Zealand adopted it we will have the same elements introduced here, as it is only to lie expected that human nature here is the same as in the United States. WHAT T SAW IN AMERICA. '“I might sav that at one town where I made a brief stay on my recent visit I observed a great crowd of people coming across the bridge over the railway station. I made inquiries as to where the crowd was coming from, and I was told they were coming from the Domain on the opposite side, where they had just lynched two niggers. They had been hung up on a tree in the Domain. On inquiring why this had been done, the only information I could get was that it was a half-holi-dn.v ; that the two niggers had been sitting under a tree eating some refreshments, and a knot of white men in passing made some insulting remarks to them. The niggers returned tlio compliment, with the result that tbo Incident suddenly grew into a serious row that ended m the two niggers being killed, thousands flocking into the Domain to see them strung up to a tree. In another town I was in I was shown a telegraph post where only a few days before a mob bad lynched a policeman from it- On inquiring and reading what was reported in the press, I learned that the constable bad gone into what be considered was a sly-grog shop, with thp result that an altercation took place between him and the proprietor. The nature of the dispute was

■! never known, but , for some reason the 1 policeman shot the saloon-keeper dead, j Word quickly passed round, and a mob i of 3000 collected, caught the policeman, ! asked no questions, gave him no oppor. tunity to explain, took him to t.. 0 telei grapn post, and hung him up. A .war--1 rant was issued for the arrest of the leaders of the movement,' and the police I stated that, in fear of their "own lives, , they were afraid to execute it. Consequently the Mayor of the town, under their law being responsible for the administration of justice, in almost the same capacity as our sheriff is here, I the warrant was handed to him to | execute. The last I heard of it was j that the Mayor had hold the warrant '■ three or four days, and had done nothing, and was not likely to do anything. It was necessary for the police to put an ii’on protection round the telegraph post to prevent its being cut away for

i souvenirs. 1 Only the other day, remarked Mr. ! Lysnar, the Rev. It. S. Gray, of Christj church, a no-license advocate, who, it lis reported, went to America to study : the effect of no-license, admitted, in I effect (as recently published in the local press), that there was a great disregard j for law and order in the no-license disI tricts of the United States. I COMMITTEE’S STRONG INDICT- ! MENT.

! According to the recent book on Tem- ! peranco Reform, published in New York j only this year, which he had just received, a large influential committee of fifty prominent men, including Senators, doctors and others, with President | Eliot, of Harvard, at its head, made ! a searching investigation into the re- ! suits bf prohibition and its effect upon I human experience and common-sense. ! in the course of its report the Committee stated:— “There has been concurrent evils of prohibitory legislation. The effect to enforce it during 40 years lias had some unlooked-for effects on public respect for courts, judicial proceedings, oaths, and law in general, and for offences of the law; Legislatures, and public servants. The public has seen the law defied, a whole generation of habitual law-break-ers schooled in evasion and shamelessness, courts ineffective, delays, perjuries, negligancies, and other miscarriages of justice, officers of the law double face and mercenary; legislators timid and insincere, candidates for office hypocritical and truckling, and office-holders unfaithful to pledges and reasonable public expectation through an agitation which has always had a moral end. These immoralities have been developed and made conspicuous.”

“PARENT OF ILLICIT TRAFFIC.” “Prohibition is the parent of illicit traffic which enormously aggravates the drink evil. It cannot be positively affirmed that any one kind of liquor legislation has been more successful than any other in promoting real temperance.” The Committee goes on to say: I ‘W e have said nothing of the secret drinking, the addiction to baneful drugs, the crime breeding, ‘speakeasies,’ and similar nameless dives, the special crop of evils for the individual and the home, which are equally chargeable to prohibition.” “Should we not profit by this experience,” questioned Mr. Lysnar.

MARRIAGES DECREASE: DIVORCE INCREASES.

According to the same authority, the official census of 1900 showed that in three no-license districts (including Maine) the average number of deaths from alcohol for every 100,000 population was 2.-11, and for nine licensed States the average deaths from the same cause was 1.63. The decrease in this rate in the licensed States from 18S0 to 1900 was 34 per cent., while in tire no-license States the death rate from alcohol did not decrease, hut actu. all v* increased bv 53 per cent.

The official statistics for 1900 also show that in No-license States marriages decrease and divorce increases. The figures, for instance, are as follows :—ln Maine there was one divorce to every six marriages, whilst in New York (licensed) one divorce to every 41 marriages. Furthermore, Maine Inis the largest number of divorces in which drunkenness is given as the direct cause, with the single exception of Connecticut.

The percentage of divorces granted in which drunkenness or intemperance is given as the cause for the whole United States is—

Of women, 1.1; ot men, 5.3. In Maine the percentage is— Of women, 3.3; of men, 16.9

Do the women of our community desiro a similar state of affairs to be created in our midst, questioned 51 r. Lysnar.

ENGLISH STATESMAN’S OPINION

The same work, lie pointed out, records the opinion of Sir Joseph Chamberlain, M.P., England’s great tariff reformer, as follows: “I have been a great traveller, and' I have seen prohibition abound in the United States, and it only leads to drinking in more forms than under the old system.” LORD CHIEF JUSTICE OF ENGLAND.

The opinion of Lord Chief Justice Russell, of England, is also quoted, where lie says: “We have to deal with the world as we find it, with men as they are,” and his Honor therefore deprecates the methods of the no-license advocates. “PARADING IN THE LIVERY OF HEAVEN.’ 1

The Rev. W. A. Watson is quoted m the same work to say: “The poisonous influence of this humbug ‘temperance’ is more disastrous than that of drunkenness ; for the latter is seen and loathed for what it is; whereas the prohibition propaganda parades in the livery of heaven.”

VISITORS TO NEW ZEALAND

In his recent trip up North, continued Mr. Lysnar, be met a number of people who were strong agaist No-lic-ense, ’ particularly visitors to New Zealand, who had been to the no-license areas. He heard some tourists at the Grand Hotel, Rotorua, strongly advising a lady who intended to make her way south and stay a few days at a leading hotel at Invercargill, not to do so, because they had just been there, and that the accommodation was bad.

They recommended her to stay at a licensed district, and she altered her plans accordingly. He also met a gentleman from whom he had obtained the following statement as to his experience at Waihi on the previous Thursday. Ho arrived at Waihi with four others. They went to a certain hotel. They asked for breakfast there, and were told unfortunately that breakfast could not bo obtained, as no help was kept, the proprietress and her daughter doing the entire work, but they very kindly supplied a cup of tea and some bread and butter. The proprietress stated to him that her husband was employed on casual shifts in the mine. This hotel was, under license, one of the best Hotels in Waihi, and employed about a dozen persons.

AN APPEAL TO THE PEOPLE

“I could give much more informa-

tion,” declared Mr. Lysnar in conclusion, “but I have stated sufficient to justify my opinion that prohibition is not the true remedy for the evils of the drink traffic, and that all electors who have the interests of the district at heart, or the interest of a relative who is addicted to drink, should go to the poll and vote against No-license, botli local and Dominion, as I say advisedly that No-license is an immoral and ungodly reform, for in Bishop Julius’ own words, it will beget worse evils than drunkenness. God knows the evils of drunkenness are bad enough, and I would sincerely urge all fair and un-biassed-minded persons to spare no effort, but to get to the poll and record their votes with a clear conscience against No-license and Dominion prohibition.