The Timaru Herald. SATURDAY, MARCH 4, 1911. PROHIBITION'S MISTAKE.

Timaru Herald, Volume XCIV, Issue 14384, 4 March 1911, Page 4

The Timaru Herald. SATURDAY, MARCH 4, 1911. PROHIBITION'S MISTAKE.

The intellectual and historical case against Prohibition has seldom been so well presented as in a brief treatise which has just been put forward by Professor Salmond, D.D., Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy at the University of Otago. Professor Salmond writes, not' as a leader or member of either of the two extreme parties who have been rending the land with their warcries, but from the standpoint of an independent thinker and student of philosophy and history. In the preface to his pamphlet, which he calls "Prohibition a Blunder," he tells as follows what induced him to ride into this fray. " The conviction lias taken strong hold of my mind that the movement against which T write is vicious in principle, and that the country is in danger of being seriously misled; and the only account I can or need give of my writing is an irresistible impulse to protest, and expose the errors and fallacies which are so pertinaciously disseminated." It is impossible in a short article to do more than give a few links of the long and careful chain of argument which the professor unfolds to show that the project of Prohibition is wrong in principle, that it involves a system or enforcing national righteousness by compulsion for which there are no precedents in history, except such as have proved shoitlived and disastrous, and that, ;f it were established against the wishes of a considerable minority. ! more and worse evils would enter in its train than the admitted evil ; which it seeks to abolish. _ The floai'lv.Ti'jis.ine.d..arffiiwent ia il.u

vclojicd clearly mikl di,spiinsion« utely, iiDil to tin; moderate jiian, ut least, the great majority of the conclusions «tntr;f] must appear (o ho unavoidable iVoin tjie author's logic. Though Jin is convinced lli.it Prohibition is it dangerous error, Professor Salniond finds much lo admire in the motives and zeal of I'rohibitioniMs, and Jie even allows some moral value to their campaign, " an ail index of improved moral sentiment in favour of a pure and temperate life. . , J<' o r even erratic movements, when there is a noble purpose nt tlieir heart, are not deprived of their recompense." After dealing with the bocalled Scriptural arguments for Prohibition, and noting the vain attempts of Calvin in Geneva, and the Puritans in England and_ New England, to promote national righteousness hy governmental force, as well as the futility in every age of sumptuary laws—-which are all prohibitions —Professor Salmond urges the injustice of forcibly depriving of alcoholic liquors the immense majority of men and women Who can enjoy them moderately, and beneficially. " Equity," he points out, " is as noble a virtue as pity, and has a firmer backbone." Bad as it is, there lire more destructive evils even more destructive evils of the flesh—than drunkenness. 'And spiritual evils are'worse than car-, nal evils. Christ said to the high priests and elders, fC The publicans and harlots go into the Kingdom of Heaven before you."' Hypocrisy,, self-righteousness, malignity are worse than sins 61 sensuousness, and these, the professor more than hints, are Prohibition's offspring. The ex- " planatory causes . of our social > evils are not all to be found in drunkenness; they are numerous o.nd various. Crime, pauperism, vagrancy and lunacy are most prevalent in lands like Spain, Italy, Turkey, India, where drun-. kenness is rare. Professor Salmpnd t claims that while a, moral function has its place in legislation, there are limits to this mor.al on its part, and that Prohibition is beyond these, limits. He argues that (1) Prohibition must be limited to acts and usages which are Inherently bad, (2) prohibitory legislation is inexpedient when there id a serious danger of creating as great or even greater evils than such as we are seeking to remedy, (3) prohibitory laws . should not be passed unless there. is a reasonable prospect of executing' them," and that in the .present case the conditions are such that the prohibition will be found futile and impossible. . We wish we could find spaoe for the professor's reasoning in support of these and other arguments, but must content ourselves with two quotations from his pamphlet :-r?

"It has to bo borne in mind." he writes, " that whereas all real and healthy moral improvement must bb spontaneous, and proceed from tho depths of tho soul outward', Prohibition can inaugurate only ag external and mechanical reformation. . The temperance it creates is but tho temperance of one who cannot bo a eluttou because ha has no tooth, or because he has only dry broad to oat; or jt is like the honesty of tho thievish man who does not steal while his maßter'B eye is on him. Enforced morality—a' morality which simply means the absence of tho on which tho vice may operate—having no root in the soil of the mind, can luire no stability. You may for a while keep an engine in motion by a mechanical pressure on the wheels, apart from any inward steam power, but it cannot be for long. What can bo tho value of a temperance of this kind when tho hour of reaction comes P Indeed, uo habit of temperance has been formed, for a mechanically enforced habit of total abstinence is not the snme thing aa a voluntary habit of temperance, nor even as a voluntarily accepted habit of abstinence."

And in answer to the_ emotional appeal of the Prohibitionist 'who. sees the evil wrought by drink, and demands tliat something drastic and immediate must be clone to atop it, the professor ■writes :

"There are no short cuts, no facila remedies, no unfailing cures, no quick expedients in the moral world. It is now well nigh two thousand years since the Cross of Oalvanr was reared, and yet the moral world has taken buti a few steps. Will Prohibition accomplish in one momont what the Cross has not done during so long a terniP We come into contact with a small corner of the world's sin and misery, and cry out to heaven to smite it all with ono blow, unci wo put our hands to wild experiments to end it all at ono stroke. It will not be. J'rovidence will not hurry tip, for all ouj fuming." • Should we then fold our hands) and resolve that it is useless trying to do anything with the drinld evil, because the problem is al hopeless one? -By no means, says Professor Salmond. "I have written against Prohibition as an unwise and inadequate measure for dealing with the evils ofdrun* kenness. But if prohibition ia not to be attempted it does not follow that nothing can be done; and it may be a future task to deal with the positive and constructive methods." That tlieso may be set forth as clearly and as definitely as Professor Sahnond has set forth the weaknesses of the Prohibition theory, must bo the hope of that great multitudo of moderate men and wcrnen, who are usually in the position of anilless, leaderless, distracted onlookers of the shifting noisy battle between the extremist forces in this struggle—a struggle fraught with such treineudou* consequences for their welfare.