The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1889-05-07
Prohibition In Cities,
To the Editor of the Press:

To the Editor of the Press:
Will you kindly allow me a few remarks
upon paragraph of yours in the PRESS of
Saturday, commenting upon the defeat of
the Constitutional amendment Of Massachu-
setts You say:
!, Experience in this State has shown that while
the prohbtory law can be strictly enforced In the
small towns and villages, in the cities its enforce
them amounting to almost nothing.
Remarks like that are constantly goiug the
rounds of the press throughout the country.
The notion that prohibition cannot be en-
forced in cities as easily and readily as in
villages and small towns is mistaken one.
Upon this subject 1 can speak freely be-
cause | know the ground thoroughly. A
great many friends of prohibition-intelli.
gent men-have so often seen the remark In
the papers, that the grog shops cannot be
easily suppressed in cities, that they accept
1t as undoubtedly true.
The Maine law has been we'll enforced in
Portland and in. all the cities in the State,
and 1t can be done again easily. At the
great d re- on Steamboat Wharf, some years
ago, the Marshal ordered all the grog shops
70 smut up and II was promptly done. At
the great celebration In this city after the
last Presidential election, our streets crowd.
ed with thousands of strangers, far into the
night, there was no sign Of drink anywhere
because the Marshal had ordered the grog
shops to be shut, and it was Immediately
done. When the Grand Army was here and
the city crowded with 10000 strangers, the
same thing was done with the same result,
and 1t can easily be done any and every day.
In the city of New York within two years
tne mayor ordered all the saloons to be shut
up on the Sabbath and it was done for
time.
There are serious defects in our law as it
now stands, but for all that, the grog shops
In Portland could be promptly shut DIP if the
orders were given to do So. Some Of the
order to do il, we could shut up every grog
shop in week." With much needed
amendments to the law they would remain
shut up, with no thought of reopening; the
Keepers OF them say So, | have. thought it
notion that prohibition cannot be enforced
In cities, tends to retard the progress of that
policy through the country.
NEAL Dow.
THE ease with which Gen. Dow now
thinks the rumshops in the cities can be
shut up does not accord with his own ex-
perlence as related some time ago in letter
to the PRESS. "There was" said the Gen
eral in that letter. "a defiant rumseller here
who had been convicted As times, and yet he
kept open shop. l took his case in hand
myself and in six months drove him out of
the trade. His brother took his place and in
six months more drove him out. Then his
brother-in-law comes in and in six months
more 1 drove him out" Thus 1t took Gen.
Dow eighteen months of hard work to break
up a single rumshop. Yet he now thinks,
apparently, that all that is needed to close
all the places where liquor can be had is a
proclamation. When Gen. Dow wrote the
letter from which we have quoted he was
contending that the reason the rumshops
were not closed was because the law was in.
sufficient