The Portland daily press., 1886-09-08

which the Republicans refuse to supply. 1t
is true that Gen. Neal Dow has asked legis-
lation which has not been granted. 1t is true
that the General has claimed that the legis-
lature has treated the prohibitory amend
mend with scorn and contempt 1t is true
that this Third Party movement is alleged
by Gen. Dow to be for the purpose of putting
down the grog shops. 1t is true that Gen.
Dow recently charged the Republican party
with catering to the lowest meanest and
most degraded portion of humanity, and it
is also true that Gen. Dow within few
days has declared that he was just as good
Republican as he ever was. Had we the
space we should cheerfully print extracts
from Gen. BOWS letters on these points, but
statement of the points ought to be suffi-
cient to convince the General that we are not
disposed to do him injustice.
Now as we have made amends for ignoring
certain parts of Gen. Dew's letters, perhaps
he will be obliging enough to pay some little
attention to the parts of his letters which we
did not ignore, but which he seems inclined
to slip over altogether. In an open letter to
Ex-Governor Morrill,, published in the Argus
Of last Friday we find this passage:
The consequence [of the refusal of Reprb lican
legislatures to pass the laws Gen. Dow asked for]
is that the volume of the liquor traffic has not
been at all reduced within the last twenty years.
Now here is where the extracts from his
letters that we did publish come in. The
PRESS would like to have him reconcile this
declaration with this one made in letter
written in 1884:
The Maine law in Maine has been a great sue
cess from the day Of its enactment The whole
State, ceased entirely from that time and has new
er been revived. There is not a distillery or
brewery in the State, and has not been for many
years, the manufacture as well as the sale of
liquors being forbidden by the law. In more than
three-tourths of our territory. containing more
franc tram is nearly or quite unknown The quantity
Of liquor now sold in Maine in violation of law
cannot be One-twentieth as much as 1t would be
drink bill would be about $13,000,o00, and we
are confident that half million will pay fer all
the liquor struggled into the State and sold in
violation of law, but we call it round million .
So we save by prohibition $l2,00o000 annually
in direct cost OF liquor, and indirectly as much
more"
II the General claims that his remark was
intended to apply only to Portland then the
PRESS asks him to reconcile it with this dec
laration contained in a letter published Aug
6, 1884:
IL is net oYerStatng IL TO say lnat IN Portland
the volume OF the liquor traffic is not one-twenti-
eth of what it was before the law. - Now,
it is not only reduced to very small proportions,
but IS carried upon the sly and is d1sreputa-
Bile as that of the gambling house and brothel.
When he has reconciled these to his salts
faction he may give his attention to this par
agraph in his letter to Gov. Morrill,:
The treatment of cases under it 1.-THE Prohibito-
ny law] show clearly that the conspiracy against
the law pervades every department of government
in the State which is under Republican influence
Now let him reconcile this declaration with
the following in letter written by him no
longer ago than last November when the
same officers were in charge of the execution
of the Prohibitory law as now:
The Maine law is as well executed as any other
of our statutes, and its effect for good upon our
moral and material interests is 50 great that it
cannot be measured by any mode of computation
now known to us.
There are numerous other seeming incon-
sistencies in Gen. BOWS utterances which
need clearingup but as the weather is warm
we will let them rest for the present.