The Camden weekly journal. [volume] (Camden, South-Carolina) 1853-1861, 1854-06-27
From the P,ohi6tionis!.
The Difference between Regulating and Proht.
biting the Sale Of Intoxicating Drinks.


The advocates of law prohibiting entirely
the sale of intoxicating drinks, are obliged to
contend not merely with those who have pc
cuniary interest in opposing it, nor yet merely
with those whose habits of so called temperate
or excessive use Of intoxicating drinks, sarray
them against it, but with the deep rooted pre-
judices Of perhaps still larger class Of men
than either, who, having grown up and lived
long and indeed all their days under system
which aims merely at regulating the sale OF
these drinks, show the usual effect of custom
in predisposing them to misconeeive, uisjudge
dislike and oppose an innovation simply be.
cause it is one. They DO not mean to be un-
Just; there is no malice in their hostility; there
is no sel6shness in their opposition; they are
well meaning men, and many of them very in.
telligent; but like those who have looked long
at the sun and see an image of it everywhere
when they turn away, or who have looked long
through colored spectacles, and see ali nature
clothed in the same hue when. they take them
Off their views of a prohbtory law are tinged
and distorted by the influence of old, cherished
and babitual ideas ON the subject of regulating
the liquor traffic. Many of the objections
which are urged against prohibitory law by
this class of men, and the whole of their ad-
verse feeling, originate, we have no doubt, IN
this source; and hence it may be well, it posi-
bic, to counteract an influence so injurious to
a good cause, by placing regulation and Prohi-
btion side by side, and pointing out, as accu'
rately and impartially. as we can, the differ
ences between them. Nothing more is neces-
sary, we think, TO vindicate prohibition as the
more reasonable, just, expedient, safe and eff:
cient measure.
To perceive clearly these differences between
the,two, We must, first of all, remind our read
ers of the fact-the announcement of which
may perhaps startle then,-that, in principle,
they agree: are precisely and incontrovertiby
one and the same thing.
A prohibitory law allows those only to sell
intoxicating liquors who sell for mechanical,
medicinal, culinary and sacramental purposes:
law regulating the sale, grants license to
sell for any purpose to those only who have
given character, pay given price for the priv
ilege, and sell under varying restrictions OF
time, place, circumstances and quantity: A
prohibitory law forbids the sale except for the
purposes specified: {. law regulating the sale,
forbids all persons to sell except those who
have purchased license. A prohibitory law
punishes all parties who violate its provisions:
law regulating the sale by license, Furnishes
all parties violating its provisions. In word,
both allow the sale under given conditions;
both prohibit the sale beyond these conditions,
and both punish all persons who violate these
conditions; that is to say, compel them by le-
gal coercion, to refrain from selling intoxlca-
ting liquors except in conformity with those
conditions.
In principle then, the one is prohibitory
law as well as the other; so far there is no diff
ference between them; and any one can per-
eeive, that however Objectionable the one may
be. because it deprives men of liberty, the 9TH
er is equally SO. To empower one, two or
three persons in a given community to sell
these liquors, and deprive every other man in
the same community of the privilege of doing
the same thing, ifsuch is his pleasures there
man who believes that liberty is less invaded,
freedom of action less curtailed by this, than
by empowering all to sell for specified uses and
no others9 All the opponents of prohbitory
law, usually so called, are, we believe, advo-
Gates of regulating license system; but why
they should be, if they object to the former
u
prives citizen of liberty, we confess ourselves
unable to comprehend; since what they re-
ceve is, on this score, quite as Objectionable as
what they reject-what they favor as what they
oppose. We can account for it only on the
supposition, that their long familiarity with the
system of regulating the sale of Intoxicating
drinks by license, has blinded them to the
characteristic pecularities in it, which they are
quick to perceive, for the opposite reason, in.
prohibitory law. "
But while the Regulating" and "prohibH.
inensystem, as we have shown. are in prlncl'
pie the same, there are important differences
between them which now demand our atten-
ton.
The first of these to present itself is sug.
rested by our remarks just made. The term
Regulating" as well as the process which it
describes, is deceptive; it speaks falsely;-or
at least, it does what is equivalent to this, it
studiorsly conceals the real nature and true
intent of license law it processes not to be
prohibtory, when it is quite as much so as any
law, so called, that was ever enacted by leg
isIature. The consequence is, that men do not
perceive the encroachment on what they term
their alberty," which it really makes. On the
other hand, the word prohibitory" is an hon
est little word /: it tells the simple and the ma
ked truth. 1t calls things by their right names !;
and hence it is, that as soon as men hear it.
they prick up their ears, see tyranny, fly 90
their arms, and give battle when the very
cause of their doing this, existed long age and
exists yet in the license laws, and was not and
is not seen by them, only. because they have
been and still are blinded to its existence, and
Al. r.,,a ofscoS an fho;r