Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1882-11-27
Temperance.
PROHIBITION OR LICENSE ?

to the wiser and truer policy to be
adopted by society toward the liquor
traffic-prohibition or license. First |
of all to determine what this policy |
should be, we need to determine what |
the relation is of the liquor traffic to |
the general welfare. Is it good or
bad? Is it partly good and partly
bad? and if so, is it more good than
bad, OF more bad than good? Having
settled that, it seems to me, there
can be no difficulty in determining
what policy the state should adopt in
relation to it.
We say the liquor traffic is all bad /;
there is no good about it; it is so
bad in its influence upon the common
wealth that nothing can be worse.
The evils coming from it to every
public and social interest, are more
and greater than those which arise
from all other sources of evil COM
bined. No one has ever denied or
doubted this-so far as / know. Mr..
Gladstone recently said of it: 'HMore
evils come from it to the people than
from war, pestilence and famine,
those three great scourges of the hui
man family Chief Justice Davis
said: eff all the evils of whatever
kind were divided into five parts, the
liquor traffic would be responsible for
four of them" No one denies that
all this is true of the relation of the
liquor traffic to the general welfare.
This being so, what should be the
policy of the state in relation to it.
The law has forbidden lotteries and
lottery offices; the manufacture and
sale of obscene books and pictures
gambling houses; houses of i'll fame.
Why? Because their influence is bad
they are inconsistent with the gener-
al welfare. This policy toward these
industries is universally accepted as
wise and right. The liquor traffic in
f1icts upon the community thousand
fold more evil than all these combin-
ed. We say therefore, it should not
be licensed, established and protect
ed by law, burt should be forbidden
and suppressed. 1t wages deadly
war upon every interest of nation,
state and people. Everybody knows
this to be true. Then why can any
intelligent man object to the policy
of prohibition?
The reason they give, and the only
one is, that probition, wherever it
has been tried, has failed to diminish
the evils of the traffic to any appreci-
able extent. Politicians say this (;
liberation of the liquor traffic will
promote the interests of their party,
they think. Some doctors of divin-
ity say this: prohibition is reproof
of their drinking habits. But it is
all false, whoever says it. In all the
history of prohibition in whatever
country-and it has history of more
than thirty years-there has never
transpired one incident which coul6
even give color to the assertion tina
it has been a failure. On the con
trary, it has been and is an in
strumentality of great good every
where.
In England there are more thai
fourteen hundred parishes where tn
liquor traffic is prohibited-and in ev
cry one of them, the result has beel
) wonderful for good. In Scotland ant
in Ireland, there are many localities
IN which the traffic has been forbid
a den by law, with the same result. /
all Scotland and in all Ireland, eX
# cept five large cities, the grog-shop
If are suppressed on the Sunday, wit
: most benefcent results, and at th
last session of parliament, Sunda
r prohibition bill for Wales was passe
n almost unanimously. The benefit
of this policy for Ireland and SEQ
y land led to that, and now Sunda
a. prohibition for England is activel
Is pushed. At the last session of pa
lament, also, resolution in favor {
!, local option was passed by majo
is ity of forty-two, and Mr.. Gladstor
has promised to bring in bill en-
re bodying that principle. In all FL
glish speaking countries, there is
strong movement for this adoptic
of the policy Of prohibition to repla'
that of license.
The liquor traffic is war "again
the church, the library and the scho
it is one phase of the warfare b
'e, tween heaven and hell" Charl
" Baxton, member of parliament, sa
that. 1t is the ''wholesale poisonil
m of the people; it drives them to he
ID ~ like sheep" John Wesley said tina
'sThe liquor traffic is the gigant
q. crime of crimes" Senator Morri
is of Maine, said that. Eyerybo(
"a knows that all this is true. If til
great sin, shame and crime be co
ms tinued, let it be against the law al
ll0 in spite of it, and not established al
At protected by law-as in those Stat
as where it is licensed.-NedI DOaU.
:. CIGARETTE SMOKING.
his Scarcely less injurious, in a SUBJ
and generally unrecognized way, tn
cd. the habit of taking s1nips" of alcof