CASE AGAINST INTOLERANCE AND PROHIBITION.

Waihi Daily Telegraph, Volume XX, Issue 6777, 28 November 1922, Page 1 (Supplement)

CASE AGAINST INTOLERANCE AND PROHIBITION.

\Reprinted from “ J'he Auckland Star’’ September 2Jst t 1922 ]

When the Rev. Wyndham Heathcol stood before a large gathering in th •Town Hall last night, announced hire self a minister of the Unitarian Churc in Wellington, and proceeded in a rea soiled and dispassionate speech to se forth the facts and conclusions of hi argument that prohibition in Americ. had not been a success, and that froi its very nature could not be a sucees in any country, lie was subjected to ; series of interruptions and interjection such as have not marked a public dis cussion of the liquor question for som years. Incidents before the speake took the platform indicated that th front seats of the ground floor and sec tions of the dress circle were occupiei by solid numbers of prohibitionists. Fo instance, when a lady appeared in thi body of the hall shortly before 8 p.m and walked to a place in the front seat: there was an outburst of cheering fron several sections of the building, t( which Mrs. Harrison Lce-Cowie bowei acknowledgment, and the cheerinj changed to a tuning-up in song of "Ne\ Zealand's Going Dry," one of the lady' compositions. This was followed b; "Strike Out the Top Line" and othe prohibition songs. There was minglec cheering and hooting when the Rev Wyndham Heathcote went on the plat form, and as he proceeded in measure* terms and logical reasoning to deal witl figures quoted by Mr. "Pussyfoot" John son and Dr. Mary Armor the interjec tions and interruptions from matronly women and grey-haired men were sc frequent that he was induced to remarf that he was disappointed that he coulc not "get a fair run" in Auckland. He proceeded to make his points quietly ■between interruptions, till he unexpec tedly turned the weapon of moral aw' religious authority at the breast* of hif opponents, challenging prohibitionists as Christians to show that the foundei of their religion was by precept. 01 example a total abstainer, and pointing out, tint Divine sanction in religioi or prohibition came, not from Christ but from Mohammed, to the Turkisl nation, in whose deeds prohibition wa; reflected. Then th«re was a furore Elderly men -rose and shook their fists in inarticulate rage, women stood and called out angrily, and before order had been restored two or three men, respectable and well-dressed, but highly excited, were ejected by the police. The meeting went more quietly thereafter till question time, when, in answer to » challenge to debate the religious aspec. with Mrs. l.ee-Cowie, the speaker remarked that he could not afford to come back to Auckland, but would debate the matter in Wellington. There was another uproar, in the course of which it was arranged for the lady to speak for five minutes on the point, after which Mr. Heathcote replied briefly, and a meeting, which had been characterised by a great deal of noise from the auditorium, closed, as it had opened, with the singing of the National Anthem. AMERICA AND NEW ZEALAND. At tJbo outset the chairman, Mr. G. Baildon stated that he was there as a citizen who stood for moderation, and not as deputy-Mayor, lie requested for Mr. Heabhoote a. fair and patient hearing. The Rev. Wyndlhanii Heathcote .stalled that he understood that a .speaker in the hall the previous night had referred to his personal appearance. (Cries of "No.") If that were not no, it was strange that he should have been toM otherwise by people who had gone out of their way for the purpose. He wished it made clear that lie was not speaking officially on behajlf of the Unitarian Ghuxch,' but merely as an individual, because Unitarians did not prolhibit or coerce each other, hut agreed to differ w 4 hen they did differ. There had been a flood of prohibition waiter let loose in New Zealand recently; much of it discoloured and mere froth and foam. He thought the Prohibitionists had helped themselves but little, and tihe people had been disappointed by the importation of Am.■:- : - can orators, male and female, of the creeping foot and weeping eye. If there we.ru any blemishes on the Union Jack it was for Britain to remove them, and Americans should be at least a* sober as we are before presuming to come and teach us the way of sobriety. "At present the U.S.A. is more drunken, more disorderly, and more corrupt than New Zealand, went on the speaker, and I take it to be a piece of shameless hypocrisy for them to come here and invite our people to 'become as they are. (Hear, hear!) Let America first cast out the beam from her own eye, and then perhaps she will see clearly to cast out the mot* from our eve. although I think by so doing she will be able to see how unfitting it is to interfere in our social legislation. For Prohibition does not. lead to sobriety, but to boot-leg whisgy and to moonshine and to poison, and to try and teach us is not only impertinence, hut is simply indecent." PROHIBITION AN OBSESSION. He considered the visits of American orators and the thimrs thev «aid in their floods of eloquence and sentiment, which were not backed up-by facts, a slur on us and our liar. The trouble was that with many people Prohib'*iou was an obsession, a fixed idea, brought about be constant repetition and declamation to the effect that Prohibition was a great and

i glorious blessing, and the wea-ker-minde people believed it without cousiderin reasoned argument. He believed that tii British people of New Zealand were to sane-minded 0 n the average to eom under the control of that fixed idct Prohibition, considered in the light o reason, was coercion, and coercion wa an old-world and discarded method. LINCOLN AGAINST PROHIBITION. In replying to the other side, he eoul not reply by argument—declamation an appeals to emotion and sentiment, bu the lady and Mr. Johnson had both ad mitted that Prohibition in -America dh not prohibit. (Applause.) Mr. Johnsoi declared one of the speaker’s quotation of Lincoln, as an anti-prohibitionist, i forgery. “Well," said Mr. Ileiithc t< “I can give another from Lincoln’s com plctc works. On February 22, 18 ft Lincoln said (hat Prohibition was im politic because it is not much in th nature of man to bo driven to anything still less to be driven ab ut that w'liol is exclusively bis own business, and leas of all when such driving is to be submit ted to at the expense of pecuniary in forests, or burning appotiti'.” So Lincoln the greatest of all American Presidents and one of the greatest of all men, wa opposed to Prohibition. (Loud app:aus< and cries of “Ancient history’’ am “What about Taft?”). Taft was an anti prohibitionist until Prohibition becauu the law of the country, and then as At torney-General, he was bound to do hi; best to have the law enforced or losi his position. CAT OUT OF THE BAG. “My figures proving that dry Cbicagt is three times as drunken as wet New Zealand were not contested, but my figures about Ohio are described as an ’infernal lie.’ -My authority was (he ‘London Times,’ and they are presumed to come from a prohibition country's icport. Perhaps another condition of prohibition was the creation of another lot of infernal liars. Possibly what had happened was that in Ohio the infernal cat had got out of the infernal bag and they could not catch it again.” (Laughter, applause, and uproar.) THE CRIME FIGURES. Mr. Johnson had shed many notes, replies to letters lie had written to various people m the States, and the speaker could get hundreds of similar notes to the opposite cJleet by writing to people in the States whom lie knew to be against prohibition. “But instead of that I will give you olficial figures, not selected, but as a whole about the elfoets of prohibition. The arrests for crime in New York, as given by the secretary of the Police Department, on May I“,' 11122, are:-1917, 187,013; 1918, 170,109; 1920 (after prohibition was in force a year), 220,749; 1921, 271,700. So again the expense of police administration has gone up: —1910, 17 million dollars; 1920, 24 million dollars. My authority is the District Attorney for the County of New York. (Applause.) GOING BACK ON PROHIBITION. “1 now come to the ease of Quebec province. Mr, Hammond (a very good prohibition speaker, and a New Zealander) had said that no State, had ever gone back on prohibition which had once adopted it. 1 quote half America as liaving gone hack lo it in the ’fifties. I [note Russia, Iceland, British Columbia, ind the Quebec province as instances to the contrary. 1 am now challenged in the matter of the Quebec province. My mthorit.y is a speech by the Premier of Quebec. 1 quoted from that spcecli in ny last lecture, and to that 1 must refer I’ou, The Premier’s speech is recorded it IcugUj in the New York “Times” of April 20. 1922, and 1 have read it. If Tie Preinfer of the province does not enow whether the province lias repealed prohibition or not I do not know of any ligher authority to whom I can refer von. (Hear, hear.) It is an awkward •ase I know, but New Brunswick is ibout to do the same thing, and in the 'Rate of Wisconsin, in a primary vole tor tiie Senate, a Wet candidate beat Hie Dry candidate by one hundred and jfty thousand votes. (Applause.) In Fact, prohibition has fallen on dvi! days, ft is rather foolish to ask New Zealand o walk into tin's spider’s web. when so nany States are so glad to get nut, of t. (Applause.) Had Pussyfoot used my arguments I would have tried to •eply to them. The rest of his speech vas mere froth and foam. (Laughter. 1 MR. HAMMOND CONTROVERTED. “All the figures which I quoted in iiiswer to Mr. Hammond, who said that inly a few rich people wore drinking in \meriea,” said Mr. Heatbcote. "hare icon left, unchallenged. The figures I iiioted were as follows: —Exports of pirita into ITS.A. under prohibition rom Groat Britain, 1,950 gallons in 1919, 11.(147 gallons in 1920, and 122.301 galons in 1921. These are British official fatisfies. secured bv the Loudon Bureau ,f the New York “Herald,” Great, Iritaiu further exported to Panada the allowing amounts .much of which was inngglod into U.F.A.; Tu 1919, 441.3(13 'aliens: 1920, 1.4 11 .(100 ga lions; 1921. 1.554,314 gallons. These are figures

t taken from the Canada Year Book. Th important thing to notice about thos figures is that they increase as time goe on and do not decrease. (Applause.) ”As regards smuggling, more impor iant than any figures is the fact ilia the U.S.A. Government has appealed p the imperial Government and th Canadian Government to help in stop ping smuggling, as they are povverles to cope with it. And yet these lecturer dare to say that only a few rich degene rates are drinking. A strange conunen tary upon such a statement appeared i : the columns of the Press on Monda; last. Air. Ford has determined to en force tlie prohibition law in his work at Detroit, in order to do so he ha had to dismiss 18,000 men. 18.000 mei are made to face starvation with thei wives and children, not for breaking tin Christian ethics or breaking a natura law, but for doing what is perfectl; natural ami right, hut opposed to ai unnatural law of the land engineered b) an organised minority. (Applause, Moreover, no loss than one hundref thousand men have received notificatior of dismissal in the States. What resnl this will have on the Labour Union who are not favourable to the law, mil not prepared to say,, but that b spells trouble there can be little doubt Anyway it is proof conclusive that whei Mr. Hammond said only a few riel people were drinking, he was very fai from speaking in accordance with tho facts. No wonder he made no attcmpl to reply to my figures. “PROHIBITION IS HARMFUL.” “I must now explain why I oppose prohibition. There are two processes of reasoning, known as the deductive and the inductive processes. By the former one "reasons from general principles to particular conclusions, and by the hitter from particular facts to general conclusions. 1 have in my previous speeches used both methods, and by bo th I have come to tho same conclusion, namely, that Prohibition is harmful to any Slate that embraces it. “I maintain that Prohibition is wrong in principle, wrong in psychology, wrong in philosophy, and wrong in religion, anc that, therefore, on the principle that you cannot get good fruit from a corrupt tree you cannot get anything but evil from Prohibition. It is a wrong principle to admit that one-half the people may coerce the other half m their personal habits. (Applause.) More especially when it is a one-sided affair like this one, when only the Prohibitionists are to coerce the other section of the public if they win. It was not a sporting offer. (Applause.) I ask would the Prohibitionists Tie so anxious for a referendum if on losing they were compelled to adopt the habits of the other side? (Applause.) Therefore 1 contend it is wrong in principle. If people want to drink soft drinks, by all means let them do so. If they want to distend themselves with self-righteous-ness and wind, let them do so, but don’t let them compel the other ma'n to do so if he would rather not. (Applause.) PROHIBITION AND RELIGION. “The liberty loving Briton in England and Scotland regards it as such, and will not submit to it. We all have a perfect right to use moral persuasion, but none of us have a right to coerce. Let them pass Prohibition here in Now Zealand, but we won’t submit to it. Again, those who try to make the world sober by compelling people to abandon drink against their will are like people trying to play the great drama of “Hamlet” with the character of the Prince of Denmark left out. The drama cannot be played without that character, as the whole play hinges on it. So you cannot make a sober world if you leave out of your consideration the decisive factor. The decisive factor in this matter is not a Prohibition law forbidding drink, but human nature which demands it. (Applause.) “Once more, it is impossible to get the English-speaking race to obey a law which* forbade a natural appetite. Impossible to make people obey this law'by a Divine sanction which could not now he obtained. That supposed Divine saneMon was given by Mohammed to that people causing so much trouble now. The Turk is a prohibition nation, reflecting the result of Prohibition. The Founder of Christianity was not a Prohibitionist, neither was he a total abstainer. T have diallenged the Prohibitionists, who pose is being so much holier than ns ordinary mortals, to show cause why they should Tout the precept and example of the Founder of our religion, I am waiting 'or some Christian to answer that, Noiody can, nobody dare. (Tremendous ipplause as a number of people rose at bis challenge.) Thus by the deductive irooess I find Prohibition is wrong Then ay the inductive method I find that Prohibition is a curse to the country. PERSONAL EXPLANATION, “T am charged with being bought by the liquor traffic, and am said to be their mouthpiece. I have already stated that I have not received a penny from that quarter, or anv other quarter for ecturing, and T will now add that I rave had no correspondence, either by

REV. WINDHAM HEATHCOTE, M.A. TELLS' PLAIN TRUTHS.

i e letter, or by word of mouth, or In any 1( . other way with the representatives of !s the trade, i want to explain my attitude to the liquor trade. J oppose Prohibit ion, not in the interests of the liquor trade, but in the interests of the i, country, to prevent an illicit trade, a e much worse trade, growing in our eouni- try. I prefer to boar the ills we have, is than run to those we what not of. “My attitude to the trade is us follows: 1 believe wine is not in itself '■ an evil but a good thing, but like all 11 other things it can be corrupted, it foly lows that the moderate drinking of it, the making of it and the selling of it, are ' perfectly legitimate and right. All good tilings can be corrupted. The Latins I ad n a saying :‘The worst form of corruption ' is the corruption of the best.’ Now the best and sweetest tiling on earth is the ' love of a man for a woman, or of a woman for a man. But that can be n corrupted and perverted into mere lust. l ' That is the worst form of corruption. (Applause.) The drinking of wine is a good and legitimate thing, so arc the ? selling and manufacturing of it, but the former can 'be corrupted into drunk: n- | ness, and the latter can be corrupted , into the manufacturing and sale of bad stuff. Eating can be corrupted by 'j gluttony, sleeping by becoming a , sluggard. i- “One of your leading citizens of Anck- ■? land saw me the other day in_ Welling--1 ton, and spoke to me about this matter of the trade. He told me that he and many others, who were not total abstainers, were inclined to vote for prohibition in order to destroy the pre- ! sent trade because it had too much ' political power. (Applause.) He said s their object was, having broken the present trade, not to make a permanently prohibition world, but to rebuild a ’ better trade controlled by the State. I replied it was not ‘so nom'n ited in the ; bond.’ That was not the issue, which was ‘continuance as we are, or prohibition and a dry and dusty world.’ “Therefore, until such time as the , Government ask the people to support it • in introducing a reform trade I must 1 oppose Prohibition. WHAT IS THE ALTERNATIVE? r “If, therefore, we reject Prohibition, ! as doomed by very nature to fail, and proved by the American and other exi perimente to have failed, what policy , ought we, as patriots and hinnanitai ians, to pursue? Although New Zealand is a remarkably sober country, yet even so there is still room for improvement. How is that improvement to be brought about and the general sobriety of the people to be increased? I reply, first by education, early education as to the nature of alcohol, its use and abuses, its benefits and its dangers. _ (Applause.) By a quickening of the public conscience on the matter of drunkenness. In the last resort it is public opinion that counts, and when public opinion 1$ very much stronger than it is on this matter of drunkenness then men generally will become ashamed to get drunk. There are a whole number of things we do not do now simply because public opinion is opposed to them, and not because any prohibition law exists against them. (Applause.) Then, too, a great deal can be done by the State taking greater control of the liquor traffic, in securing the sale of good liquor, and in limiting but not prohibiting access to spirits. “Perhaps the Province of Quebec lias solved the problem in the best way up to date. This Province of Quebec adopted Prohibition for a time, but the results were so disastrous that the measure had to be repealed. But Quebec did not return to the old method. The system adopted in Quebec is as follows: Beer and wines are sold in hotels, and they can be obtained at meals. Peer is sold by the glass at bars. "Wines and beers can be had at restaurants for meals. But the sale of spirits is under stricter supervision. They are entirely under the control of the State, and are sold at Government stores. The individual citizen can go to those stores, and can obtain a bottle at a time, but no more frequently than is reasonably necessary for legitimate use and purposes of sickness. Only the best spirits are sold after careful Government uni lysis. The plan is not calculated to prohibit drinking, but is calculated to lessen drunkenness.” (Applause.) COUNTKI! DEMONSTRATIONS. At the conclusion of the address the speaker devoted a quarter of an hour to answering written questions, am] gave Mrs. Lee Cowic five minuter to answer liis challenge, when she argued that the wine of the Bible was unfermented grape-juice, and Air. TToathcote replied that all Protestant and Catholic Biblical scholars agreed, without any question, that the wine blessed by Christ was fermented wine. When a vote of thanks to the speaker was carried, there were continuous ironical dicers from non-sympathisers, but dozens of people went forward and formed a queue to shake Air. TTeatheote by the hand. Among these were professed Americans and Canadians who declared that he had told the truth about America.