NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVII, Issue 14473, 13 September 1910, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

LICENSING REFORM IN CANADA. The Toronto correspondent of the London Times, in a very striking article dealing with licensing reform in Canada, remarks that during recent years the agitation against the liquor trade has taken a wide sweep in the Dominion. There has, he says, been no such revolutionary advance as has characterised the movement in the United States, but from year to year the "dry" area has been enlarged in most of the provinces. The ground occupied seems also to be more firmly held than was the case 20 or 30 years ago. The Crooks License Act adopted by the Legislature in 1876 was the first sweeping measure of license reduction passed in Ontario. The Crooks Act on going into effect cut off 1880 licenses, reducing the total number in the province from 5818 to 3938. During the years that have intervened

since the Act was adopted the number of licenses, by the action of the license, boards and by local option, has been steadily reduced. There are 811 municipalities in Ontario. Of these 411 have no licensed hotels. In January next over a hundred additional municipalities will vote to extinguish licenses, and as yet there is no sign that the local prohibitory wave has receded. By a recent change in the law, to which the prohibitionists are determinedly opposed, it is necessary to have three-fifths of the total vote polled favourable to local option, in order to give the measure effect. But a similar handicap is imposed upon the liquor interest in repeal contests, and one effect is to give permanence to local option where it has been established. At the last municipal elections the Act was repealed in only two municipalities while it was adopted in 77. In Prince Edward Island no liquor licenses are issued, and its Legislature is now memorialising the Dominion Government to prevent the importation of liquor into the province. In Nova Scotia and New Brunswick wide areas are under prohibition. Fifty years ago drinking was general and drunkenness common in Ontario. Whisky was freely provided and freely consumed at logging bees, barn raisings, ploughing matches, and every form of public celebration. The change in the habits of the people amounts to a revolution. Drinking in many rural communities is almost unknown. Rural hotel property has ceased to have any substantial value. Drunkenness is a grave social stigma, and an absolute industrial disqualification. The last three Speakers of the Ontario Legislature have been total abstainers, who did not provide wine at their sessional dinners. More and more wine is excluded from public banquets. Even the clubs impose greater restrictions upon their members.