The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1883-12-01
Avn Untenable Theory.

An Untenable Theory.
In another column correspondent,
commenting on a recent editorial ar
tiele In the PRESS on the preva-
lence of great crimes suggests, that the
real cause of so much crime is strong drink.
That many offenses against the laws are d.
rectly traceable to the drinking of alcoholic
beverages we shall not attempt to deny. Mel
ther shall we attempt to deny that many
others are remotely traceable to the same
cause. We have not one word to say In de-
fence or excuse of rum drinking. 1t is one
of the greatest evils of the day, and perhaps,
directly and indirectly, is productive of more
sin and misery than any other vice of the
times. But we are compelled by the facts
to withhold assent to the theory that what
are known as "great crimes" that is crimes
that imply deep moral turpitude, are to be
attributed chiefly TO rum drinking. We
could give assent to that proposition only
by asserting 10 another, namely: that rum
drinking has increased in Maine during the
last twenty-five years, for statistics show
that great crimes have increased in that Pc
rlod greatly out proportion to the increase
Of population, and therefore 1t must follow
as a logical sequence, if their cause be rum
drinking, that this habit has also increased.
Now everybody who is familiar with the his
tory of Maine knows this is not the fact. On
the contrary since the enactment Of the
prohibitory law some thirty years ago, rum
drinking has greatly diminished. This is a
fact universally admitted, the only controver-
sy in regard to it seing whether it should be
attributed to the prohibitory law chiefly, or
to moral influences.
The first prohibitory law was enacted in
1851. The population of Maine was then
5S5, 159. There were then in the State pris-
on 81 convicts, of whom four were murder
ers In 1878, after the prohibitory law had
been in operation twenty-seyen years, and
the decrease in intemperance had been very
marked, 1.-THE friends of the prohibitory law
claiming that three-fourths Of the drunken
ness which prevailed before its enactment
had been banished from the State,) there
were two hundred and seventy-fve convicts
in the State prison and Jail workshops, of
whom fifteen were murderers. In 1850 the
population was 5S7, 100; in 1878 1t was &c.
624. The increase of crimes in excess of
the increase of population was 296 per cent,
and of murders 375 per cent If the chief
cause of crime is intemperance, how does it
happen that during period when intemper-
ance was rapidly decreasing crime was
rapidly increasing? Perhaps our cores
pendent can explain this consistently with
bis theory.
Now let us recall the circumstances of
some of the great crimes which have been.
committed in Maine in recent years, and see
II they sustain our correspondents theory.
Take those of the present year. Thomas
~~y US was deliberately murdered few
Wesks ago by Oscar E. Blaney. Blaney has
confessed and told che circumstances of the
crime. From beginning to end there Ia
nothing in his narrative to show that he was
under the influence of liquor at the time or
was addicted to its use. 1t was hatred and
thirst for revenge which impelled him to
fire the deadly shots. The Italians who
killed their fellow laborer On the Shore Line
railroad were sober Greed for gold was the
cause Of their act. Swanbeck, the Aroos-
took man who shot his neighbor In quar-
rel over division line fence, was sober.
So was Wilkinson, who shot the Bath DO
liceman. The only homicide of the year
which is fairly attributable to strong drink
is the shooting of Kelly at Calais
Let us go back still further. Lowe, the
the West Cumberland murderer, who lay in
wait in his fathers barn and killed his
with an axe, was sober. II was not
that impelled him to his horrible
bat hatred of his brother and the ex-
pectstlon of inheriting bis property. In his
confession he did not pretend that he was
drunk at the time. Gordon, the Thorndike
murderer, who killed his brother and his
brothers. wife and set their house on fire to
conceal the murder, never claimed that his
crime was the result of fam drinking. The
same motive which influenced Lowe infu-
enced him. Wagner killed the women on
the Isle of Shoals that he might possess
himself of their money. 1t was lust
that impelled Harris, the Auburn muir
oo1ciy W Lis CEiIues COb one OF
these murders, is traceable to the
habit of rum drinking Revenge, greed
for gold, or RIGHTEOUSNESS was at the bottom
Of them all. Another circumstance tending
to show that great crimes in this state have
not sprung from rum drinking, is the fact
that with very few exceptions the brutal
murders which have been committed during
the last ten years have been committed, not
in the cities where rum shops abound, but
in small country towns almost entirely free
from those demoralizing resorts. The truth
is that the offences which rum is response
bic for are as rule those which are COM
mitted in the heat Of passion. A crime
which gives evidence of having been DELHI
erately planned and executed is almost GER
tain to have been the work of sober man,
for the drunken brain Is not capable of such
work.
The nap1oorofio Ctata Hop,xo.Atoo