Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-09-20

it for granted that. the people of Con- are too hard-headed and sen- sible to have anything to do with an ex- pertinent that has been failure wher- are not mistaken in their view.
 If prohibition, either by constitutional provision or statutory enactment, could be made to prohibit, there might, in- deed, be some plausible basis from which to argue for it's adoption. But so long as it is made a state rather than a national issue it can never be made effective even where it is adopted, and this for the reason that interstate com- merce will always make easy the obtain ing of liquors. Where there are two states lying side by side, one having pro- hibition and the other licensing the sale of liquors, the citizens of the former will always secure whatever they may want in the line of spirituous drink, and the latter will be deprived of the revenues it ought to enjoy from the amount of liquor consumed within it's limits. It is this fact chiefly which in- clines far-seeing and practical men to scout prohibition as being harmful to the interests of the commonwealth. Interstate commerce makes it impossible for state prohibition to prohibit, and in fact it has been found that state pro- hibition works injury to the moral and material interests of the state by bring ing about free traffic in rum. And this is more particularly the case when pro- hibition is made part of the constitution. The average prohibitionist thinks that if he can get his doctrine into the constitu- tiOn it ktriumphs, but it does not. That is the hour when it declines and de- cays, for it is a proclamation and not a performance. Such, indeed, has been the experience of Maine which has had prohibition for a third of a century and where there is as much drunkenness to- day as ever, of Rhode Island which was unable to enforce prohibition after hay ing placed it in the constitution, of Kan sas and Iowa where the internal revenue collectors tell us liquor is as plenti- fully sold as ever; ill fact, of every state that has tried the experiment of consti- tutional or statutory prohibition. Mas sachusetts found local option better sys- tenn than prohibition, Pennsylvania pre- fers the license system and Connecticut is going to be guided by the experience of other states and have nothing to dc with prohibition.
 The prohibitionists may theorize and picture the evils of drink till thei1
 tongues wear out from the roots, but
 practical men cannot see in their doc
 Urine any effective remedy for the evils
 for which it is proposed. They do no1
 believe that prohibition can be made te 1 prohibit in Connecticut while the man
 ufacture and sale of liquor is allowed ir
 contiguous states, and they are not dis
 posed to shoulder by additional taxation
 the revenues of which the state would be
 deprived if it should adopt prohibition
 Until it shall be made national issue
 with the intent of driving liquor iron
 every state in the Union, it would b.
 simply suicidal for Connecticut to hav'
 anything to do with the pretty but i'm
 practicable theories of prohibition.
 Connecticut's policy is ill the continu
 ance of her local option license system
 and this policy will be maintained.