The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1885-08-15
A View of Prohibition.

a common error with men and
women who favor constitutional
prohibition of the liquor traffic is
dWelt on by Rev. DR.. Hatfield, writ
ing in the Ado0nce. There are those
who seem to believe that, this side of
! prohibition in the constitution of
every State, there is nothing to be
accomplished for the cause of sphrie.
ty and peace of society. 70 this
class DIR. Hatfield addresses himself
putting with great emphasis this con-
clusOn.
1T Is important that we make n
wise use of the laws we have for
the suppression of intemperancc
until we can replace them by better
ones.
just at this point, as it seems to
me, some of our friends act with sim
guar unWisdOm. In their zeal to Sc
cure the abstract and ideal. they lose
sight Of the practical. They will
have prohibition or nothing. Local
option laws, and laws forbidding the
sale of liquors to minors, and on the
Sab ath, do not interest them. They
render little or no assistance to those
who are enforcing our present laws
to save the children ana youth from
becoming drunkards. Some of them
60 so far as 10 demand the repeal of
all license laws and the removal OF
tax on the manufacture of whisky.
If these wild schemes could be carri-
ed into operation it requires no pro.
phetic vision to anticipate some Of
the results, Whisky would be so
cheap that a topper could drink him
self into state of more than beaStly
drunkenness for two or three cents.
Grog shops would be ten times as
numerous as they are now Towns
and counties would lose the protec
ton now secured them by local Op-
ton. The land would be deluged by
drunkenness and debauchery to an
extent of which we can hardly form
a conception. Decent men would be
driven to combine for system of Ii
cense and regulation, and we should
probably hear little more Of prohibi-
ton for generation to come. He
that is wise will consider these
things"
This puts so tersely the practical
side of the case that to attempt to add
to it is to ''gild refined gold" But
this much may be said, that there is
not community to which DR.. Hat
fields remarks do not apply.
Let US see how it is at home. We
have a. local option law in West Vir-
ginia. No equity that does not want
it need haye license. The majority
do not want it and do not have it.
But there are counties in which liq-
uOr is sold without license and there
is slight effort if any to enforce the
law. In the city of Wheeling liquor
is sold every day in the week by per-
sons who have no license. Liquor is
sold on Sunday, to minors, to habit
ual drunkards-all in violation of
excellent laws familiar to every
body.
The men and women who are de-
manding constitutional prohibition
are not using their time, their money
or their influence to bring about the
enforcement of these liquor laws.
Why ignore the practical work of to-
day and bend their energies towards
an ideal of the future? Do they
think it hopeless to try to enforce the
laws that we have? If so, what in
duces them to believe that absolute
prohibition will annihilate the liq-
uOr traffic ? Who is to enforce pro-
hibitiOn? We may be sure that pre-
hibiton will not enforce itself
the lesson Of all prohibitory efforts IS
against such nope.
The enforcement of existing laws
ought to be mu ch easier than the
passage and enforcement of new and
more radical provisions, but this idea
does not seem heroic enough for ad-
vanced prOhiDitionists, and so they
go on in their own way and, as
Il 1.