The Club Smoking Room

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XL, Issue 14, 4 April 1908, Page 5

The Club Smoking Room

By

HAVANA

GOMING events,” remarked the lawyer, ‘"are already beginning to cast their shadows before. Ministers are touring the country and frightening the natives with the test of the motor horn in view of the general election, and our prohibitionist friends are once again on the warpath. The intelligent elector is being wooed, if not won, by faddists and cranks of all sorts and persuasions, who are anxious to force their views on others by means of the law. It seems to me that the present system of having no-license in some districts and not in others, is a farce. Liquor is brought into the prohibited area from outside, and drunkenness is twice as rife as it was before. And worse than this, we find drink brought into the home, so that often the whole family is corrupted. Then, again, an enormous trade is done in slygrog selling, so that many are tempted to become law-breakers, and the sanctity of the law is endangered. The quality of the liquor sold in some of these shanties is absolutely vile, and a man who is half poisoned by it has naturally no redress. The proper way to try prohibition would be to make it applicable to the whole colony, or not to have it at all. There would be some sense in the thing then, and if it was carried prohibtionists would have a fair chance to show' what they could do. Our present system, as it seems to me, breeds deception without materially lessening drunkenness.” © © © “Your argument,” replied a prominent advocate of no-license, “would apply equally well to any other law. Because there is a law against theft people who .wish to steal have to do so on the sly, and to that extent the law encourages deception. If, in spite of prohibition, slygrog selling is widely prevalent, then the fault is not in the law, but in the administration of the law. Of course, we would all like to see prohibition carried throughout the colony, but the present system seems to me to be better than none at all. If hotels are done away with throughout a large electorate, it is something to be thankful for, even though drink is brought in from over the border occasionally. For in New Zealand the most common cause of drunkenness is the pernicious system of shouting. Many a man who enters an hotel with the intention of having just one drink is led on to having five or six through meeting friends and acquaintances, who all want to shout for him. There is a Strong prejudice against “drinking with the flies,” as it is termed, and fellows will ask chaps they barely know to join them, and then, of course, they have to have a drink with the others in turn. It is this custom as much as anything else that we want to put down. I am quite sure that it has proved the ruin of many young fellows.” © © © "All the same,” said the commercial traveller, “there are thousands of people yvho like a drink now and then, and who never exceed the bounds of moderation. !Are they to be penalised for the excesses of the drunkard? If you say that to touch alcohol in any shape or form is a Crime, then you are quite within your rights in prohibiting it to all. But if you merely contend that excessive indulgence is a crime—and I think all right-

minded men would be with you there—you introduce a dangerous principle into legislation if you prohibit a thing, not wrong in itself, merely because some people indulge to excess. The excessive use of anything is bad. Doctors tell us that too much tea or coffee or even meat is highly injurious. Are we then to protect those who over indulge in these things by prohibiting their use altogether? Are we to muzzle everybody because most people talk too much ? If you came to sum the matter up you would find far more harm was done by people not learning to control their tongues than is done by people not controlling their taste for alcoholic liquors. Parliament passing a law against excessive loquacity would be a sight worth seeing.” © © © “Well, there I take you up on your own ground,” answered the previous speaker. “I contend that except in rare medicinal cases, alcohol is never productive of any good. Even in moderation, it does harm. Tea, coffee, and meat in moderation do good, and we can make a right as well as a wrong use of speech. But the only right use we can make of intoxicants is to throw them away. It is so easy to pick holes in a scheme when you are comfortably arguing the matter in an arm chair. But come with me, and see the harm drink is doing in thousands of homes, and then defend your hotels of you can. It is not merely the cases that are reported in our Police Court news—though they are bad enough—but many of the saddest cases never reach the public eye. I know personally of many homes where the wife has to try and hide her husband's failing, and where ill-treatment and suffering are borne in silence. Yet many of these men would be good husbands and good fathers, but for the drink. Granting that in rare cases a moderate use of alcbhol does no harm, or even may be does some little good, is this worthy to be set off against the enormous amount of harm caused by drunkenness? You talk of principles in legislation. My principle is to do the greatest good to the greatest number.” ® © © "As a medical man,” put in the doctor, “I cannot agree wth you as to alcohol having no beneficial effect. I believe really good wine, or a really good light beer would be much better for most people than the eternal swilling of strong tea so prevalent in the colonies. If people made it a rule never to drink between meals, but would take a little sound light wine with their din-* ner it would be a good thing for them. The principle is a thoroughly sound one that the law in regard to anything not wrong in itself, but only wrong in excess, should punish excess but not prohibit the thing itself. Drink is not tho only thing that breaks up homes and causes untold misery. I am not inclined to think that it is even the chief tiling. I fancy from my own personal observation the excessive extravagance of dress indulged in by many women, and their slavish following of fashion, is responsible for more real harm than alcohol. I need not particularise or bother you with medical slang, but any doctor will tell you that many things dictated by fashion are a serious menace to healthy

motherhood. Many a young girl also is led astray by a passion for finery, and a desire to outdress other girls. And I have known scores of decent, honest, hardworking men who have got into debt, and gone under through their wives’ senseless extravagance and love of display. And it is generally the best men who are thus made to suffer for the sins of others. Yet, I presume, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union would not advocate prohibition as a panacea for this evil, and prohibit our women folk from dressing at all.” © © © "Prohibitionists,” put in the parson, "do not seem to take into account that national character may be more seriously damaged by grandmotherly legislation than by drink. We want to teaeh the people the right use of things, not prohibit their use. I believe, with the doctor, that a love of dress is responsible for more social evils than a love of drink. I believe it even ruins more homes. But if I believed the evil to be tenfold greater than it is, I would still sterenously oppose a law that sought to prohibit women from wearing silks and satins and lace and jewellery. Character is formed by bracing the will; by overcoming difficulties and temptations. If a woman is saving and thrifty because she has schooled herself to bo so, then she has done much. If she merely refrains from wastefulness because she cannot get further credit, then her real self has profited nothing. And so, if a man is sober and industrious, and steady of himself, he is a good citizen, and a valuable asset to the community. But if he is merely sober because he lacks opportunity to be anything else, his real character has not benefited at all. You will never rear a nation of men if you curtail all individual liberty. I cannot reconcile prohibition with the teaching of Christianity, else what becomes o fthe miracle at Cana of Galilee, or our Lord’s own saying that, in contrast to the ascetic Baptist, He, Himself, had come eating and drinking.”