The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1873-09-13 00:00:00

KIDDERMINSTER LICENSED VIC-
TUALLERS' ASSOCIATION.

The third anniversary dinner of the Kidder-
minster Licensed Victuallers' Association was held
on Tuesday evening at the Horn and Trumpet
Inn, Park Butts, the Mayor (Mr. W. Green) pre-
siding. Several members of the Corporation were
also present, and the company included Mr.
Edwards (secretary of the Licensed Victuallers'
United Towns' Association of Birmingham), and
Mr. Bishop, of Birmingham, who .attended as a
deputation from the Licensed Victuallers' United
Towns' Association, Messrs. T. J. Lawrence,
Thompson, G. Hopkins, W. Brucknall, Robins,
Milnes (secretary to the association), Mr. H.
Saunders, jun. (solicitor to the association), Mr.
T. Green, and about sixty members of the society.
Mr. Councillor Cooke (president of the association)
officiated as croupier on this occasion. Loyal and
patriotic toast having been proposed and drunk
with much cordiality, the Vice-Chairman sub-
mitted " the healths of the Borough and County
Members." Out of twenty-four divisions orrthe
Licensing Bill when before the House of Commons,
he was pleased to find that their hon. member was
present eight times, and voted against the Per-
missive Bill, which was thrown out by a majority
of 250. Although the House of Commons had
thought fit to thrust upon them, as licensed vic-
tuallers, some of the most obnoxious clauses which
ever were imposed upon any association in the
land, they were bound to respect them for the
onerous labours they were called upon to dis-
charge.
" The Mayor and Corporation" was proposed by
Mr. G. Hopkins, to which Alderman Tovey re-
sponded, remarking that the engineer of the
sewage and waterworks informed him that morn-
ing that in three weeks from the present time
the sewage would be pumped in the town. As far
as the tanks were concerned, the contractor had
stated that they would be finished by the close of
the present week. The Corporation were now in
a position to supply the town with water, for
though there was something the matter with the
pumps, there was a temporary pump continually
at work and the reservoir was full of water.
_ _ _ _

_
Mr. Councillor Holloway submitted "the health
of the Magistrates," to which Mr. W. Boycott
responded.
The Mayor, in proposing prosperity of the
Licensed Victuallers' Association, assured the
audience that it afforded him very great pleasure
in being present. Licensed victuallers' were as
respectable a body of men as any he knew. As a
magistrate he had often felt that the House of
Commons would have acted more wisely if they
had, in passing the Licensing Act, taken it out of
the hands of the magistrates to fix the hours of
closing public-houses and other things which they
were called upon to decide. Such things, he
believed, would have given better satisfaction to
the country, if the hours of closing had been fixed
by Parliament.
The President of the Association (Mr. H. Cooke)
responded to the toast, and assured those present
that the association was ins good position, numeri.

- .
cally and financially.
"The health of the Mayor" was proposed by
Alderman Tovey, which was enthusiastically re-
ceived.

Mr. H. Saunders, jun., proposed "The healtha
of the Visitors and Deputation, coupling the name
of Mr. Edwards, of Birmingham, with the toast.
If there was a charactelistic of the age, said the
speaker, it was towards combination. All classes
of mankind combined together, and society might
be said to move in masses. We saw every descrip-
tion of labour united together—mechanics, agri-
culturists. and even now he was told that the bell-
ringers had struck as a body—(laughter). There
was a great necessity for them to unite together
in the present day. He fancied that people who
tinkered, and theorised, and experimentalised
with the trade, scarcely grasped the magnitude of
that interest. It was a positive fact that the
trade with which they were connected produced,
in respect to invested capital, no less than
.£117,000,000, more than was embarked in the
cotton firm trades united. That was an enormous
fact, and if combination was required in other
trades, surely it was required, even if viewed from
a pecuniary kind of view, in the licensing question.
He was not about to deal with the special griev-
ances connected with the recent Act of Parliament,
for he was of opinion that where these grievances
spring, there they would have to be assailed.
They had endeavoured to remove some of the evils
of that Act, but they had found the local adminis-
trators unwilling to move. He (the speaker) was
not very much surprised to find that such was the
case, nor could he cast much blame upon them for
not taking action. On Wednesday last there ap-
peared in the columns of the leading journal of
the country—the Times—an article written with
considerable force upon the results of the working
of the Act for twelve months. Of course it did
not pretend to be inspired, but no doubt it was
semi-inspired. The intention of the article was
to discount the effects of the returns from the
various Brewster Sessions throughout the country
as to the working of the Act. '1 he article began
by speaking of the Act as one which had been
much abused. He did not know much about it
being a much abused Act, but he knew that very
few people were satisfied with it. It had been
denounced unquestionably by the trade; it had
been cursed by the interested portion of the
public; had been ridiculed by judges, who had
spoken of it as a perfect jumble, and not capable
of being interpreted and construed ; and grumbled
at by magistrates, for even their excellent chair-
man that evening, the chief magistrate of the
borough, had stated that he would much rather
that the Parliament had taken upon their own
shoulders what hail been imposed upon them.
Wherever he went he found the same sentiment
muinating from gentlemen in similar positions.
Beyond that the independent press had denounced
the Act OA one which ought to be taken back and
reconsidered. The Times admitted in the first
portion of the article that the Act hail been a
failure, for, says the writer, "that drunkenness
has diminished in but few instances, and actually
increased in many seemed to be beyond doubt."
They know that the preamble of the Act stated
most explicitly that the main intention of the bill
was to diminish the amount of drunkenness which
then existed, and yet the same writer stated
further on "that the Act had been working bene-
ficially for its direct and immediate purpose." He
failed to see how drunkenness could have increased,
as they were all witness to, and yet at the same
time how the Act could have worked "benefici-
ally for its direct and immediate purpose." It
might be said that we have quieter streets. He
granted that, but that was not the purpose for
which the Act was passed. If the Legislature
had desired to effect each a reform as that they
could have passed a law for "sending the British
public early to bed"—(laughter), and not one to
prevent the spread of drunkenness—(hear). We
could by very stringent legislation make the
streets of the country very quiet, but it would
only be done by reverting to those tyrannical laws
in force in the dark ages when the peasant was
compelled to cringe and bow at the voice of his
earthly lord and master; laws which he fancied
the liberty-loving people of this country would
not endure for any Tength of time—(hear). He
was not going to argue in favour of allowing men
to carouse and fuddle all the night through, but
he would c.JI their attention to the effect that
early closing had had upon their large towns, such
as Birmingham and other places. It had greatly
increased secret drunkenness—(hear, hear). He
happened to know, but unfortunately the bulk of
the public had not the means to get from reliable
sources as to the extent that secret drinking was
carried on, but he did know that in Birmingham
secret drinking was greatly on the increase, and
the same could be said of Liverpool, Manchester,
and other large places. Then the vvi-iter of the
article in question said that the true cause of the
increase in drunkenness during the last year was
owing to the shorter hours and the higher wages
given to artisans. He had not one word to say
against shorter hours of labour, but the question
of increased wages in all industries was open to
grave doubts. He admitted that such was the
case in the iron trade • but than he reminded his
hearers that there had been more than &commen-
surate rise in the price of all neceesaries of life,
making the purchasing power of wages at least 25
per cent, less than what it was two or three
years ago. So that when they considered the
argument of the increase of drunkenness as caused
by the higher wages given, they had to make a
set-off by saying that the purchasing power of
money was not what it was formerly. They would
remember what a monstrous bill the bill of 1871
was, when the British statesmen had the effrontery
to make a bill proposing that no matter what
lamount of labour and personal inconvenience the
licensed victuallers had experienced in getting
together a connection that in ten years the pro-
perty should be "put up to public auction and sold
—" Shame"). No wonder not only that the trade
aroused themselves, but that the public also rose
up and protested against such an obnoxious bill,
and yet that writer said that that line of policy
was the right one. According to the statistics
which had been made public, there had been dis-
qualified no less than 53,000 public, and 43,000
beerhousea at once. If such were the sentiments
made public by the leading organ of the land,
which, no doubt, assisted in ruling our Ministers
and law-makers, it was high time that the, should
continue more closely to protect that which they
rewarded as their rights—(hear, hear). Despising
selfish motives, he was conscious that English'
liberty was bound up in thelyrinciples they were
advocating; and not only as licensed victuallers

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