LICENSING POLL

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue LXXIV, 8 April 1919, Page 5

LICENSING POLL

I STRONG PRONOUNCEMENT BY j ARCHBISHOP REDWOOD [(Published 'by Arrangement.] . The following letter of His Grace Archbishop Redwood (Metropolitan) was read on Sunday in all the churches of the Archdiocese of Wellingtons Archbishop's House, Wellington. „ ~ „ , March, 1919. tiev. Dear Father,— The clergy and people of this Arehj diocese and of the other dioceses in New Zealand naturally look to their Metropolitan for right guidance on the matter of Prohibition—National Prohibition—with which this Dominion is threatened. I hope such a calamity will never befall it. For what is the altogether untenable position of the Prohibition advocates? It is this: If they argue that wine (alcoholic drinks) is an evil in itself, then absolute Prohibition, even for Sacramental purposes, should emphatically follow: but this argument transfers .responsibility from ! the agent to the instrument, and so '■ destroys morality ■ moreover, it is contrary to Scripture and the emphatic ' teaching and example of Christ who j used wine Himself, and in instituting ' the Holy Sacrifice of th 6 Mass, made it part of the essential matter.' ' ai- they argue that wine, or alcoholic ' drink, is not an evil in itself, then regulation of its traffic is surely the moral course to adopt. j But if Prohibition is urged on account of the misuse which some make of it, then, to be morally consistent the same people should demand that because the sexual instinct is abused by some to the extreme of impurity, therefore all union of the sexes should ! be forbidden. On the same principle printing, the theatre, dancing, should ' be prohibited. All this would, or' c-,irse, be absurd, and is almost bias-I ;.' i.emy against marriage, which is a I - oly ordinance of God and is honored ! v all men. The position of the Pro- ' ; hibitionist is accordingly against logic j and common sense. ■ I j Reform is needed—not Prohibition—:' reform wise and moderate and patient in the light of experience, education,; and true morality; in the 'interests of > the great body of the public, and especially of moderate men who constitute the majority of the people. To • ■brand New Zealanders, who are gen- j erally a sober community, as a drink- j sodden * people, demanding drastic • legislation, is a vile and monstrous f calumny. The whole scheme of Na- j tional Prohibition is a great step backward ; it would ibe an odious and inquisitorial tyranny, foreign to the basic principle and spirit of British law. As the Archbishops, last October, aptly stated in their important pronouncement, "We view with misgiving and alarm the crude proposals *of those Prohibitionists who demand drastic legislation which would be an unwarrantable infringement on the reasonable liberty of the mass of the people; which would most probably be inefficacious for the purpose in view, and which, in the end. would produce more evil than it would remove." ; , Prohibition is indeed fatal to Liberty, ■because it involves a serious outrage against the natural rights and liberties of individuals and contemptuously disregards the claims of dissenting minori- . ties. It is also fatal to Temperance, though not a few sophistically confound Tdmperanoe wjtft Prohibition. Temperance is a growth, like all moral laws, in the individual and the community. Prohibition proposes to establish Temperance according to the Criminal Code. Temperance is positive and appeaU to man's sense of self-control, to his reason and conscience. Prohibition is negative, and appeals to the sense of fear, to pains and penalties, and utterly ignores man's habits and education. Temperance is the development of naan's righteousness and self-control. Prohibition is the reduction of man to a position of compulsory national *total abstinence by the Criminal "Law: Temperance is the heritage and blessing of a free people.- Prohibition is the yoke 'which a country constructs for itself when it confesses its inability to self- l control, and from whch it will take long years to free itself; Temperance is the badge of self-respect and orderliness. Prohibition is the symbol for hypocrisy and deception. All the secret encouragement to sly drinking, the utter lack of control, the alienee of all authority, the vile decoctions served, are sure to generate a low moral atmosphere of great mischief. And such plaoesi of sly drinking greatly appeal to the young. Once let a young man become contaminated by the moral tone of the "sly grogs," he will be damaged morally, if not utterly ruined. Prohibition will undoubtedly generate lawlessness. Its extreme character, ite far-reaching measures, its enormous penalties, stamp it as a grinding despotism —the fruitful parent of disorder. Prohibition is as despotic as any' law !of the worst despot. It utterly disregards and tramples under foot the undoubted rights.of minorities, whom it grossly insults by the way it flaunts 'their wishes and destroys their privileges. The minority under it would 1 obey, or suffer outrageous penalties. i Wherever it prevails it is monstrous m I every way and grossly insulting to the ! intelligence of the large minority. If it is carried in New Zealand we may expect that shortly the land will be filled with dene, all of which will be schools of hypocrisy, evasion, lawleeenessi and deception. One extreme be- ! gets another. Prohibition would plunge us into a course of folly bringing turmoil into the polities! of the country, . perjury and evasion into the courts, \and deception into the people. Let it not ihe argued that "ely grog" would i become an impossibility when through--out the whole Dominion there would be jno liquor to be procured. And what j .could prevent the manufacture of ©ly ' grog in the country and its introduci tion by a widespread system of smuggling? But in anjr case this plea is jno excuse for its inherent and ram--1 pant tyranny. . !In a recent publication regarded as ' authoritative 'by the No-License Party these words occur: "I recollect on one } occasion, in conversation, one of the brewers said to a Prohibitionist, 'I hate • the .drunkard as much as you. The i Prohibitionist refilled: 'That remark • defines the difference between us. You \ hate the drunard, I hate the drunkard- ' maker.' " It is this very externation ;in teaching which is sure to add to the i list of the drunken. Nay, it destroys all morality. This teaching would ren- ! der morality impossible. Anarchy and . lawlessness would be rampant. "I | hate the drunkard-maker." In terms !of logic, he hates the hotelkeeper who j sells wine, the barman who serves it, ! the commercial traveller who repreI sents wholesale houses which stock i wine. A 6tep further: he would hate j the wine-grower, the laborer in the vineyard, and the carter who carries j the wine, and so on. In large drapery establishment* certain persons practise shop-lifting. Prohibitionist teaching would exonerate them and blame the drapers. "I hate not the thief, but the thief-maker." Such a doctrine | would abolish the Ten Commandments. jTo shift the responsibility from the [ man who drinks to excess to other per- ; sons is to encourage sympathy with the drunken, and still more is this wrought by absolutely stopping the i supply, not only to the few lawless, but io the whole comunity. This remedy is

fatal to morals. It is fatal to set u» a compulsory and ascetic total abstinence society for the people and to enforce ite rules by a drastic Criminal Code. A true educational development undoubtedly means that the whole of man's attributes are to be brought into true harmony. Here lies the worth. <£ the individual and th c true , greatness of the State. A mere negation such as Prohibition would never accomplish this; in fact, a greater •violation of its principles' can hardly be conceived. This National Prohibition craze is mainly the work of a handful of fanatics, wh.ie some honest people, even some Catholics, owing to what they have suffered from, drunken fathers or mothers, husbands or wives relatives or friends, put 6entiment be^ fore reason and yield to the temptation I of resorting to a remedy worse than the j disease, iiut let Catholics and all good Christians be timely warned. We know that there are in the ranks of the Prohlbitionsists, though not, perhaps* amongst the present leaders in this country, bitter enemies of the Catholic Church and of the Mass. There is a real danger that these people would later on try here, as they have done in at least one important State of America, to render the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass impossible. Listen ,tc what one of their leaders in the United States has said. Sidney Catts, Governor of the State of Florida, at fti& annual convention of the Anti-Saloon. League held in Washington as recently as December, 1917, made the following, declaration: "Liquor may'not be imported into the State of Florida (after 1 get through with the Prohibition measure and after the Bill has been, passed by the people) for any purpose whataoAfdr, and the man who needsliquor for his religion had better prepare to take his religion out of Florida." But I shall be told that we run no such danger in New Zealand, as we havejbne assurance of the leaders of. the No-License League, together with the Government, that satisfactory regulations will be made to allow wine to be procured for Sacramental purposes. lam not at all convinced that these regulations will be satisfactory. First of all, what are they? ■ Nobody has geen them, and they are not tb be made, I understand, until after the poll is taken. I s it reasonable to ask Catholics to vote for National Prohibition on the strength of regulations not yet made, and about which we know nothing—whether they will be satisfactory or otherwise? •But even though the present Prohibition leaders and the present Government may be perfectly sincere in their avowed purpose to make regulations that will be entirely^atistactory, what guarantee have we that in a few years, once National Prohibition us the law of the land, other Prohibition leaders and another Government—on* the ground, say, that the exemptions are being abused—may not insert aB. amendment in the Act doing away with all exemptions, even, for the Mass, or recasting the regulations in such fashion as to practically prevent the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice? We have had too much experience of recent "rush" legislation on the part of our Parliament not to fear similar "rush" legislation in regard to Sacramental wine, especially, I.repeat, as the No-lacense movement numbers amongst its most prominent advocates men who publicly denounce the Mass. as "an unchristian superstition," and make no secret of their determination, if they had the power, to prevent its. celebration in New Zealand. I consider, therefore, that I would be failing in my duty did I not warn our people of the dangerous possibilities that are. before them.' Is the great Catholic Church; in this pretended free land, to depend for the exercise of a natural and divine right on any fallible and fallacious Government or set of politicians? Such a thing is an insult, an outrage, and an. indignity. It implies a prying and inquisitorial interference with every altar and every priest in the Dominion. I call, therefore, on all Catholics m the Dominion to vote dead against National Prohibi- . tion, as they value common sense, liberty, and the sacred claims of their Holy Faith. Let them band with the best men in the Dominion, th© majority of good and moderate men, to stamp out this noxious thing, National Prohibition, for ever. Let such inquisitorial and grinding tyranny never curse this free land. The Catholic who votes for National Prohibition in the present condition of this Dominion— whatever' other exceptonal case might be conceived in other countries to- make Prohibition tolerable —is true neither to his common sense nor his love of freedom, nor his loyalty to hie Holy ■Religion. Let him cast • his vote patriotically and religiously against it, in this and every other election. Let him not become the slave of a false system inspired by narrow-mindeTThess and fanaticism". " • : I remain, Rev. Dear Father, i • Yours sincerely in Christ, FRANCIS REDWOOD, S.M., Archbishop of Wellington and Metropolitan.