Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-05-08
DRUNKENNESS as A CRIME.

In the Arena DR.. Henry A. Hartt dis.
cusses the liquor question from new or a
comparatively new standpoint His idea
is to abandon all efforts to regulate the
traffic, and treat drunkenness as a crime.
1t pervades all classes, says the essayist,
while regulation can reach only the class
that goes to the bar. 1t is germinal
crime, and therefore prohibition, high
license and such remedies cannot reach it.
We punish theft, burglary, and murder,
why not punish this other crime and
associate it with felonies when oft re-
peated Theft is an abuse of money,
drunkenness is the abuse of an article in
the abstract useful, he argues. Shall we
then abandon punishment of the former
crimes and seek to prevent them by moral
suasion or regulative laws? His idea is,
therefore, 10 commit temperance reforms
to the church and any other moral agen-
cies that choose to prevail upon men, but
that so far as society is concerned as
government, il should deal with the re-
suits of the abuse of liquors as it does
with other abuses and condemn drunken
ness as crime, as was done by the Mosaic
law, and as has been done in the State of
Minnesota. The argument of the doctor
is ingenious; for instance, he says that
manufacturers and dealers in liquors are
vitality interested in the suppression Of
drunkenness. Its existence and spread
puts their business under social ban; it
occasions them innumerable annoyances,
and puts them to great expense in resist
ing efforts made to suppress their
business, and in preventing injuri-
Gus legislation, and finally that
from drunkenness they do not derive
any real pecuniary advantage. 1t is as
serted that the Minnesota law, which was
adopted year ago, works well and gives
the people general satisfaction.
So far branding the drunkard as a law
less person when in drunken condition is
concerned, there will not be any strong OBJ
lection made by society. That he is a
nuisance is undeniable. That he is enti-
tied to pity may be true where his drunk
enness has assumed the form OF disease
but the proper place for him then is an
ASYLUM for treatment of the disease. But
il is not clear that because drunkenness is
an otiense. there should therefore be no
resulative measures by society of the busi-
ness Of liquor selling. There is no COM
munity in the civilized world where some
degree of regulation Is not exercised over
ii, as well as over most other kinds OF bust
ness. That regulation is not cure, but a
palliative, is no argument against even SC
much Of effort on the part of society TO pro
tect itself. If prohibition lacks the essen.
tial element Of strength to be found in COM
munity support Of its measures, it cannot
be said that this is true Of regulation. But
to punish drunkenness as crime, to
make il barrier TO good citizenship, as
the church makes it barrier into heaven
according TO its code, is by no means a
visionary idea. Whether it would work
the suppression of drunkenness and rele-
cate il wholly to the haunts of vice and
crime. as the essayist insists it would, can
only be conjectural. In Minnesota the
oxneriment is too recent to justify any set.
fled conclusions being reached concerning
it.
Brutal indulgence in anything that oper'