AMERICAN PROHIBITION.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XVII, Issue 973, 29 October 1908, Page 22

AMERICAN PROHIBITION.

“ HOLDING DOWN THE LID.”

Governor Fort, New Jersey’s famous moral reformer, who is an administrator of similar stamp to Governor Hughes, of New York, on Sunday, August 30, succeeded in what Americans call “holding down the lid” in Atlantic City, “and sitting on it.” In other words, he directed the strict enforcement of the new ordinance forbidding the sale of intoxi-

eating liquors within the city boundaries oh Sunday. Now there is no more popular seaside resort in either hemisphere’ than - Atlantic City. Its sands, ..its sunshine, .its. five miles of {{broadwalk are for ever • hoaxing ..Philadeiptiia {. or Baltimore, or Washington, or‘even New York, to half-empty themselves at all seasons ■ of the . year. . At the moment there Averfi... probably 2 0 0,0 00 w visitors crowding its hugs hotels and innumerable boarding houses. On almost any hot day .in summer you can see 50,000 people disporting themselves in the wave.s. You can .therefore readily guess the commotion caused by Fort’s; tfirMat send a military- gtih.rd th’.the batik : doors of the ■ saiocfiTs," and de-, vices employed by visitors to avoid the distressing of spending twenty four consecutive hours on ai thirsty August day .Without anything ! more; stimiflatifig {than “soft” drinks. There are 2 ? ofii dfeensed; saloons in J Atlantic City/ {So tightly was the; lid &e!id down that the police say that not aYsipgle drop 1 of intoxicating liq-! uor wasj.sald between midnight on' Saturday- and midnight oh Sunday. I Over the front "door of the saloon' on Illinois-avenue one mute and inglorious Mr. Dooley had hung the J sign, “No liquor sold on Sunday, j and d ——d little- on/.Monday.” Another proprietor had/ knotted about the knob of his lotiked bar-room door a beer bottle draped with black crepe, and beneath were the words,’ “Sme 1 ! and pass' right on.” The landlord' of the Old Vienna, one of the best known saloons on the Atlantic coash, invited a coterie of poliicians to .tea in { his place during the afternoon. He put up nut-brown ale for all, and since Governor Fort himself cannot prevent a man giving away intoxicants on Sunday or any othek day, this seaside Samaritan was hailed as blessed throughout the evening. Lafe on Saturday night hundreds of people were seen staggering under a weight of beer cases, or trundling suspicious-looking casks in children’s waggons on the way home. When midnight" camel and brought two hours when the saloons might open, the rush for liquor resembled a huge tidal wave. - :