The Otago Witness. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (TUESDAY, MARCH 2, 1926.) THE WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 3755, 2 March 1926, Page 51

The Otago Witness. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (TUESDAY, MARCH 2, 1926.) THE WEEK.

"Nunquam allud oatora. aUud sapientia dhoi." -Juvenal. "Good nature and good eenso must evar join.''-* POP*. The summary of the operations of the Otago Harbour Board for Harbour the past year, which was Progress. presented by the chairman to the meeting of the board on Friday, was a welcome reminder that Otago is progressing. A record year, so far as revenue is concerned, has been registered, and a programme of harbour improvements is in a fair way f achievement. This will enhance the popularity of the port, and must necessarily contribute to the prosperity of the province and of the city. During the past few years the measure of co-operation between the board and the civic authorities Ims been most beneficial, and in no small measure must the credit for the successful Exhibition enterprise be given to the Harbour Board. Mr Loudon has proved himself a chairman of vision, and, aided by members of the board, much has been done to improve the amenities of the city as well as the facilities of the port. In this work the services of the board’s engineer have been of considerable value, and it is anticipated that his visit abroad this year will result in the adoption of a still more progressive policy for general advancement. The of several Ministers to Otago is a matter for general conThc gratulation. For a period Ministerial not so recent it appeared Visit. that the southern portion of the Dominirn was not considered of much importance, if Ministerial attention was to be the applied test. There is a welcome change apparent, however, and increasing attention is being paid to the requirements of the southern provinces. The Prime Minister has, in his capacity as Minister of Public Works, shown a full appreciation of the importance of Central Otago, and if his public usefulness was measured solely by his enterprise in that territory it would be rated high. At the week-end three Ministers of the Crown were in Dunedin, and the Minister of Health had just left for the north. This in itself is proof of a live interest, and the tour of the province can only bring further conviction of the soundness of its future. It is an especially pleasing fact that the Prime Minister is accompanied by the Minister of Lands and the newly-appointed Minister of Agriculture (the Hon. O. J. Hawken). Mr Hawken is not a stranger in Central Otago, but his present visit in the capacity of Minister of the important folio of Agriculture is especially welcome..

After a term of six years Sir James Allen is retiring from the posiThe High tion of High CommisCommissioner- sioner for New Zealand, ship. His work in this office has been marked by thoroughness as it was in all his political life in the Dominion. He has served his country well in a difficult position, made somewhat unsatisfactory by the impossibility of accurate assessment of achievement. This latter consideration has apparently led the Commonwealth of Australia into making an experiment of doubtful utility. This arrangement has entailed the appointment of a separate officer charged with tho task of keeping in touch with the British Foreign Office and reporting to the Federal Government without reference to the High Commissioner. An arrangement of this character must lend to misunderstanding, if, indeed, not to something more serious.

It has been suggested in the Dominion that an independent trade commissioner should be ap]N>intcd in London, aud that the office should be self-contained. This would give the Dominion two representatives in London, and would be charged with difficulties similar to those which threaten the Australian arrangement. On such a proposal Sir James Allen is entitled to be heard, and his view may be regarded as disinterested because he is about to relinquish the office. After pointing out that during the past two years the office has had a competent man to deal with trade questions, Sir James says:— It is necessary for the High Commissioner to have a sufficiently capable staff to enable him to give most of his time to Imperial matters. I do not agree with the policy adopted by Australia appointing a certain individual to be in touch with the Foreign Office on the one hand and with his own Prime Minister in Australia on the other. It is unnecessary to create two different departments in London. It is essential to have matters all under one control. There are many obvious advantages. Unless you have a unified control you arc not going to get the best man to come here as High Commissioner. It is a very inconvenient position for an individual outside the High Commissioner’s Department to be in communication with the Prime Minister of the Dominion without the High Commis sioner’s knowledge. After all. the High Commissioner can only advise the Prime Minister. He cannot take any executive action. That advice, experience teaches, should come from a man who is the best the country can send, capable of setting aside his party politics and looking at problems from the wider aspect of Imperial relationship.

The cablegram from Washington containing the announcement Law and that the Alcoholic Liquor Reason. „ Traffic Committee of the House of Representatives has voted unanimously to undertake an inquiry into the conditions obtaining in the country under prohibition was not unexpected by those conversant with the trend of opinion in America. Following the “Face the Facts’’ conference of over 1000 delegates, which demanded legislation permitting the manufacture and sale of light wines and beers, the * decision is significant. It is impossible to get unbiased testimony from the extremists on either side of the question, but impartial observers cannot fail to note the course of events. Since the publication of the damaging report on prohibition by the committee headed by the Rev. F. E. Johnson, considerable sections of the Christian Church have evinced a more critical atti tude towards the question of prohibition. The executive of the Federal Council of Churches has decided that the Federal Council should keep out of the field of prohibition enforcement and education. In America temperance reformers, like reformers in some other fields of activity, have committed the fatal error of taking the short cut instead of keeping to the main highway of educative progress. “In the last analysis, if not in the first,” observes a discerning critic of prohibition, enforcement, “strong public sentiment is what enforces laws. Many of our profes sional reformers still seem to think that laws and force are the main reliance.” In other words, when law is not based on reason and when it does not harmonise with the conscience of the nation, it has little chance of success. “Law observance requires education of conscience,” says the Rev. Charles Stelzle, Presbyterian minister and prohibitionist, who contributes the following opinion on the question It will do no good to insist with irritating finality that because the Eighteenth Amendment to the, Constitution was passed in a perfectly legal way, the question is forever closed. It is not sufficient merely to insist upon obed! ence to the law 7 . There should be more of an inclination on the part of prohibitionists to rest the claim for observance of the Volstead Law upon its merits as a social measure. There are many people in our country to-day who want an honest consideration given to the subject of what actu ally constitutes intoxicating liquor within the meaning of the Eighteenth Amendment. This is not a matter of mere opinion. It is a demonstrable fact. It is absurd to say that one is necessarily opposed to prohibition because one desires to know all the facts regard ing its appeal and the possibilities of its enforcement and its observance by that very considerable minority throughout the country who arc utterly opposed to the law as it now stands. Furthermore, it is a fallacy to assume that the acknowledgment that certain of one’s opponents’ arguments arc true, and that he has made something of a cose, necessarily degrades one’s position or dishonours the cause which one represents. It is claimed by many prolii bitionists that they are engaged in a war, and that ouly war tactics should be employed. There can be no question about the large amount of drunkenness which prevails throughout our country to-day. It may be seen upon the streets and in all public places. Liquor may bo had in hotels. Indeed, one is solicited by bellboys and other employees, and the bootlegging industry has become so disgraceful that in some parts of the country it is practically bringing about the nullification of the Eighteenth Amendment. It has developed a boo f, " n ' aristocracy which will have a large place in governing us in the next generation. Summed up by an influential American newspaper, the position of prohibition is this:—

If the failure of prohibition to enjoy the full satisfaction of its promises has been recorded, it is not because it has not been tried with more resources in support of it than any law tlia* was ever enacted, but because the spirit of its undertaking and of its performance has been ignored in its fanaticism the very tinman forces upon which it must depcilti for its success. Whatever its moral merits and spiritual preconceptions, it can not be jammed down the throats of a free people by a legal process, while, on the otW hand, it is conceivable that, by being approached in a manner to slowly but surely "win over the support of the people, it would secure general enforcement with no greater outlay in money and energy than is required to enforce any other law. The State of Connecticut had headed toward such a social condition under its local option system years before the Eighteenth Amendment was promoted. Is there, then, no other remedy for the evil upon which practically all are agreed than more and more severity in the enforcement of the Volstead Law? We believe there is, aud that it is not so hostile to prohibition as the VVheelerites believe.