The Placer herald., 1874-05-02
LETTER FROM GOLD RUN.
GOLD Run, April 26, 1874.

ED. HERALD
Here is something that I copy from the An.e,
ican Builder, which l wish you would publish
PRoHIBIToRY LAWS.
"Amid the excitement on the subject OF tenn
perance, caused by the earnest efforts of the
Jealous advocates Of prohibition, it may be well
for us to pause ere we cry too loudly for legisla-
ton, and to consider the probable result of the
attempted enforcement of any law prohibiting
the sale of liquor.
In every State where prohibitory legislation
has been tried, experience has shown that there
are as many temperate and Incorporate
drinkers Of forbidden beverages during the op-
Grafton of the law as there we're before its pas
sage. There is not a gallon less of spnits wine,
or beer sold. There is no diminution in the
number of sellers, only probable change in
their character The only difference is that
poorer liquors are furnished, because the bust
ness has become more hazardous, and fines and
costs are paid to support the legazed brigands
who must be supported in some way. Pro-
hibitory laws, wherever enacted have conspicu-
ousy failed, if their object has been to promote
the cause of temperance. They have simply
driven into secrecy that which was before car
red on openly Open bars are bad enough but
hundred open bars in the same district can not
do as much injury to the morals of youth as one
secret den With such an experience any man
less than a fanatic must admit that the effort to
curb intemperance by prohibitory laws has had
a sufficient trial. Apply more force and you on
| ly increase the resistance. The trouble is, that
| the law is expected to accomplish an impossible
| ty. AS the earliest culture of mankind began
| with the grasses and fruits, from whose juices
exhiliaratng beverages are made, So until the
end of the world the vine will continue to Weld
its clusters, and men will use them, wisely or
unwisely, as they use misuse all the other
gifts of the Creator. The need of chemistry
cookery, medicine and sacramenal rites, for
bid the entire Punishment of alcoholic liquors.
They cannot be got rid of, and it would require
bold man to say that ii would be well to do it.
Like our appetites and desire, they will serve us
if kept in subjection; # they master us they be,
come our fierce tormentor. In no other case
have Legislatures tried plan so stupend usly
foolish as to make men moral by attempting to
| Danish temptation. Evil and good are placed
before us in the moral world Each implies the
other. Virtue implies vice resisted. Men see
! frugality and wastefulness, industry and idlo-
ness, reverence and blasphemy, temperance and
sottishness, in constant contrast. The opera
ton of moral causes is silent but efficient;
whereas legal enactments never prevented an
OATH never raised bushel of wheat; never
saved the honor of n woman or the manlness
of man. To suppose that men are to be made
wise, rich, chaste, temperate or religious by law
is a notion belonging wholly to the class that is
ignorant of the history and philosophy of legs-
| lation What we want is not a compulsory,
cloistered and celibate virtue but one that is ro-
! bust and vigorous enough to live with men in
the world, and there TO choose the better and
resist the worse. Small children who from sweet
meats are locked, will one day learn self-control
| by the collie, if not by natural counsel The
cupboard cannot be locked for them always
| Like all other productions of nature and art
we may assume that fermented and spirituous
liquors are to be and remain the common prop
erty of mankind forever. Whether they are to
be an aid TO the weary, the invalid and the aged,
or whether they to be the cause of unwonted
evils in the moral as in the material world, will
| Qtptuu upon tue lulure lnenUll ana moral cult
ure of the race. For that mental and moral
cultivation we must look to home influence and
example. We must point to the old-fashioned
lessons that have been inculcated from the time
of Silenus and Hoch until now. The case is
beyond the Statutes. The law cannot lead in
expressing the moral sense of mankind; it must
follow and at distance sufficient to prevent
| tbo of
which are keyed upon pitch higher than pub
lie sentiment; and with reference to prohibi-
tory law there is general and profound convic-
ton that it is imperative; that it is unable to
accomplish what its trainers intend; that it will
not diminish the evils caused by drunkenness;
and what is worst of all, that, while it contin-
ues it practically allows the unlimited sale of
liquors, the worst as well the best and by
the basest men well as the most honorable,
in secret clubs and in the nurseries of other
vices. So far from being advocated, prohibi-
tory law should be arraigned as vast instru-
mentality for the increase of drunkenness for
adding to this evil habit the contagion of kind
red vices; fer being remotely the cause of adul-
terations that poison the bodies and benumb
the souls of the dram-drinkers of this genera
ton. With the best and purest motives, doubt.
less, the advocates of prhibitory legislation have
gone blindly on to sweep out our Atlantic Ocean
of rum with their prohibitory brooms but it
does not stay swept out, and now they stand in
the way. They block the avenues TO the halls
of legislation; they thunder from orthadox and
heterodox pulpits. Their prohibition" seems
to clang from the very steples on Sundays; they
have the patent right and permit no infringe
ment. No one is friend OF temperance if he
does not approve their absurd law and the ty-
rannical proceedings under it. 1t is quite time
for these legal reformers to retire and study his
tory, law and the spirit of laws. Their failure
has been signal Their patent machinery does
not work. Drunkenness increases. There il
no control over the sellers, and the community
has not the least pretepsion against fabricatng