PROHIBITION.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCVI, Issue 11052, 2 September 1896, Page 6

PROHIBITION.

TO THE EDITOR.

Sie, —Mr Quinn, ex-secretary of the Licensed Victuallers’ Association, is, no doubt, a deeply-read and eloquent special pleader for the liquor traffic; but surely he is hard up for facts when he has to go back to pre-historic times to prove his points. Can Mr Quinn inform us, however, if our Aryan ancestors licensed the traffic in liquor, for that is the point at issue ? That they used soma juice to intoxicate themselves I well believe. So do a number of savage-tribes at the present day; but it was and is for the purpose of maddening themselves so that they could perpetrate horrible atrocities on their enemies, which no reasonable person will say tended towards a pure and athletic racial development. If space would permit I could instance the North American Indians, the Maoris and other savage nations, who, directly the white man’s liquor is available for their use, degenerate to an alarming extent. I hardly think that even Mr Quinn would advocate a free traffic. in liquor for the Maoris; but, if we are to follow all the vices of our ancestors, why should Mr Quinn, a professed disciple of the Darwinian theory, stop at our Aryan ancestors? Why not copy the social qualities of the great anthropoid apes, and advocate the total abolition of civilised instincts? It is no use, however, to try and confuse the issues of this question, which are simply the right of the people to deal with and abolish a disreputable

traffic, which in its monopolistic ramifications is entirely opposed to the principles of democracy.—l am, Ac., *H. L. ROGERS, Rangiora. TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —The Rev Mr Olphert in his speech from the cart-tail on Saturday night told his hearers about all the broad act es and bales of drapery which could be purchased with the money spent annually upon drink in this colony. According to him, if the money were not spent upon drink, happy prosperous homes would spring up all over the land, and everyone would be well fed, well clothed and contented. There would be no more poverty, no more unemployed, a reign of smiling plenty would be inaugurated. Happy wives would receive all their husbands’ earnings, and could buy as many gowns and bonnets as they pleased. But Mr Olphert did not say what guarantee he could give that this pleasing state of affairs would really ensue as a result-of total prohibition. If "'the traffic ” were, completely swept away tomorrow there would still be a few illegitimate channels through' which the rescued coin might find its way. I know in-, stances, and so does Mr Olphert,. where some prohibitionists do not hand over all their ' earnings to their wives, or laudably spend those earnings in support of their families. Imbibing cold water does not mean imbibing all the virtues. There are are more expensive vices than an occasional glass of beer or a nip of whisky. Therefore, it seems to me that if total prohibition were an actuality, that the sweeping away of the drink bill might not, after all, bring about all the new gowns and home comforts of which the reverend gentlemen speaks. The redeemed dollars might only go to minister to a few of those other vices to which weak humanity, in its imperfect state, is, unfortunately, sometimes addicted. If there i.; a dint in one place there is apt to be a bulge in another. If Mr Olphert t. Id explain how, after the dint being •...ade, he is going to guard against the possibility of a corresponding bulge, his picture would, at least, have beeii more complete. If Mr Olphert had really told us what would be the result of prohibition, he would have said that as soon as total prohibition became law the programme of the Prohibition Party would-be to immediately proceed to attack some other “vice,” which translated means some other section of individual liberty ; and so on and on, until there would be no liberty left to attack, and the people of this colony would be as much bound by the fetters forged by a tyrannical despotism as a Russian serf. This would be the real result of total prohibition ; this would be the only logical outcome of the liberty-clipping gospel of the prohibitionists. —1 am, Ac.. INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY.