New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1852-03-19

Laber and Liquor.
In the course of our occasional trip,
through the country, we often stumble on
| facts which throw more light on the Maine
Law controversy than any amount of iogi'
cal abstraction could do. Some of these
facts we will here briefly set forth
ST. JoHNsBURY, in North Eastern Ver-
mont, is growing, thriving village Of some
1900 inhabitants, the present terminus Of
the Passumpsic Railroad. The extensive
manufacture of Pateat Scales. Steelyards
and other Weighing apparatus by Messrs.
Fairbanks g. Sons, is the handspring Of
its activity and prosperity, employing di-
rectly some two hundred men, and perhaps
thrice as many indirectly. These men are
all, or nearly all, in thrifty and comfortable
circumstances they are saving money,
building or buying houses and otherwise
making provision for old age or misfortune.
Their children are being substantially and
thoroughly educated the workmen have
their own seats in churches and are officers
of the town. Their families Interchange
visits with those of their wealthy employers
without thought of condescension or favor
as why should they not 1.-THE Social scale
being a reflection of the Intellectual and
Moral. They have their Reading Room
and Library, and are foremost in support
ing and directing the Lyceum, which has
weekly Lectures from such persons as they
wish to hear, who are called thithsr from
all parts of the Eastern States and paid
for their time and efforts. The Railroad
employees, who may be sixty or seventy in
uumber, finding it convenient to reside near
the station, at some distance from the
Scale-woIks aforesaid, lately raised $500
BY subscription and procured a snug library
of their own, though they unite with their
fellow-citizens in supporting and enjoying
Lectures. The village has scarcely an
idler, has no rabble and no sots. Why does
it differ in these respects from most others
We answer-Because the MAINE LAW has
in substance been enforced there for years.
The laws of Vermont forbid the sale Of Ia
toxicating Beverages, and those laws are,
at least in st. Johnsbury, enforced. The
result is such population as we have indi-
Gated.
Such is one picture Now look on this:
HAvERsTRAw, ROckland Co., N. Y, is a
village about equal in size to St. Johnsbury,
situated On the Hudson, some forty miles
above this City. Its chief business is
Brick.makirg, which gives employment
throns.n all but the winter months to sew
eral hundred laborers, who work hard for
fair wages. But Haverstraw is drink
ing place, with four or five well patron
lied Rum taverns and several less con-
spicuous rum.holes. In these rum holes,
big and little; the hard earnings Of the
laborers are in good part squandered,
90 that very few Of them have dollar left
when Spring comes round to set them at
work after their Winter vacation. Two or
three Of the Rumsellers have grown rich,
but al the laborers remain poor. Temper
rance Moral Suasion' has scarcely reached
them, for they are nearly all immigrants
and Catholics, who do not mingle freely in
our societies. The only moral force to
which they defer is that Of the Catholic
priest, Who, though not, we believe, q pro-
fessed Teetotaler, secs and laments the in.
jury done to his flock BY Rum, and fights il
vigorously. He does not hesitate to search
the dwellings of his people whom he knows
V have no license, and on finding demijohns
of liquor there, smashes them without cers-
mony. But the chief rum-hole frsquented
BY bis people is licensed, and against that
he is powerless. The keeper, a nominal
Catholic, who has grown rich by the Liquor
traffic, has threatened to turn Methodist ii
the priest offsnds him too seriously-a
threat which We trust is insufficient to
swerve the latter from the line Of his duty.
But so long as the Rum Traffic shall be
shielded and sanctioned by law, the priest,
great as is his moral power, can never break
up.
on recent Walt to Haverstraw in behalf
OF Temperance, friend described to us a
scene Of which he was an eyewitness on tho
4tA Of Jaly last. A mob, partly American
BY birth, partly lli'h, had collected in the
street, and, being crazed and hrusalized bv
liquor, commenced wantoa fight. Native
against Irish. The fray was becoming seli-
Gus when tho Catholic priest made his APP
Pearaace, mounted On horse and armed