GREATEST MORAL ISSUE

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17348, 13 May 1924, Page 12

GREATEST MORAL ISSUE

ENFORCEMENT OF LAW. FAILURE WITH REGARD TO PROHIBITION. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Received May 12. 8 p.m.) NEW YORK, May 11. A message from Springfield. Massachusetts, says that, in an impassioned speech denouncing Federal enforcement of the prohibition law, Governor Pinchot, of Pennsylvania, addressing the Methodist Episcopal Church Convention, declared that the enforcement of the Jaw was the greatest moral issue before the American people. “The sordid betrayal of the Eighteenth Amendment by politicians is known from coast to coast, and openly tolerated.# The alliance between bootlegger 3 and politicians has corrupted our children, degraded characters, destroyed health and cost the lives of uncounted thousands. It has debauched our Government and shamed us befote the world. The failure of enforcement is sornetimeß claimed to mean that the Eighteenth Amendment has failed. It means nothing of the sort. AA'e are infinitely better off now, with all deductions made for the wretched enforcement, than we were before.” Governor Pinchot blamed Mr A. AV. Mellon. Secretary of the Treasury, fof the failure of Federal enforcement, and adds: “Moral indignation is not enough ; resolutions are not enough. This ir, a '-ase for fearless, untiring, uncompromising action in a cause to which every Church member in America is irrevocably pledged.”