WILL THE “HOME JOURNAL” EXPLAIN?

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XIX, Issue 1096, 13 April 1911, Page 20

WILL THE “HOME JOURNAL” EXPLAIN?

There are cue or two points, however, that the “Home Journal” might very well explain for the benefit of its readers, before it proceeds to further criticisms of this journal. Surely it should be in a position to explain why it is, that (if No-License is the marked success it is claimed to be in the electorates that have “gone dry”) it has been impossible to maintain the three-fifths majority in more than two of those electorates, after the first poll. The only districts maintaining the majority are Clutha and Grey Lynn. So far as the latter is concerned, there is probably as much liquor goes into the homes of the people as is consumed in the other suburbs of Auckland. It is certain that large quantities of liquor enter the electorate, of which absolutely no account is taken officially, and it is equally certain that the liquor so consumed is obtained by the moderate section of the community! What these people will have to say on the question of National Prohibition remains, therefore, to be seen. There were six hundred clubmen in Ashburton who voted No-li-cense in 1902, because they argued that the closing of the hotels would not prevent them getting their liquor. But, when they were deprived of their Club Charter, the case was very different, and those six hundred clubmen have been voting Restoration ever since. There is one other matter, touched upon by the “Home Journal,” upon which it is desirable a word should be said. In a sort of vain-glorious way, the Prohibitionist organ throws down a challenge. It wants the trade to issue a journal on similar lines to its own, but advocating Trade interests, along certain prescribed lines, that it maps out with a good deal of unction. It is evidently panting to distinguish itself and to find a foeman worthy of its steel, so that, like the ‘Eatenswill Gazette,” which it is so desirous of emulating, it. may breathe out fire and brimstone against the hapless victims of its wrath, and demolish to its own satisfaction, if to no one else’s, the wicked arguments of its “reptile contemporary.” We have every sympathy with its desire in this direction, but we would really suggest that, during the period of waiting, its editor should amuse himself by explaining how it is that, after over sixty years experience of partial Prohibition, the American of to-day consumes almost six times as much liquor as did the average American of 1850. In that year, Dr. Henry Smith Williams tells us, the consumption of alcholic beverages in the United States was 4-08 gallons per head; in 1910 it was over 23 gallons. And,, when that nut is cracked, we have a few others to propound.