The Portland daily press., 1891-07-10

The Bangor Commercial thinks that In
view of what it calls the results of the en-
forcement of the prohibitory law in Portland
(said results being large amount of drunk
enness on the Fourth of july 1t is ''about
time for the sensible, conservative people of
all parties to take the liquor question out Of
the hands OF the fanatics and hypocrites who
have had full swing at 1t for 40 years, and
see If some reasonable, rational laws cannot
be enacted" The people referred to as
sensible and conservative" are of course
the people who believe in license and the
fanatics and hypocrites" are the friends of
prohibition, and the rational law of the for
mer would be undoubtedly license law.
Now as matter of fact whether there were
many drunken men or few in Portland on
the Fourth of July, whether there were more
on the last Fourth than on the preceding
one has very little bearing on the question
of the relative effectiveness of prohibitory
law and a license law in suppressing intern
perance, except upon the assumption that
prohibitory law is merely measure to sup
press intemperance by making it impossible
to procure the liquids necessary to produce
intemperance. Ii this assumption is cor
rect, then the fact that men manage to get
drunk when the law is enforced does tend
to discredit this method of suppression.
But we do not think this assumption
is true. There may be sanguine people
who have an idea that the prohibitory law
can be so thoroughly enforced as to compel
man bent on getting drunk to keep sober In
spite Of himself, but we imagine they are very
few. The rational believers In prohibition
do not expect to accomplish much in the way
OF the reformation of drunkards by means
OF 1t. they do not anticipate that they can so
thoroughly suppress the sale of liquor that
man who has made up his mind to get drunk
will be obliged to go sober because he cannot
procure the necessary liquids. With the rs-
tional advocates of prohibition one of its chief
virtues is that 1t tends to prevent the forma-
tion OF drinking habits. and In this respect
is vastly superior to licence law When
the habit has been formed they would not
expect to see 1t broken up by a pr0hibitory
law, so IL thirty men who were addicted
to the habit started out in prohibition city
to get drunk, they would not be surprised,
nor would they regard the fact as discredit-
ing prohibition, If these men succeeded in
getting drunk as quickly as in a city where
there were no restrictions. With the rational
advocates of prohibition the change in the
character of the liquor shops produced by
prohibition is of quite as much Importance.
in fact even more-than the reduction of
their number. If the thing to be chiefly
aimed at were the latter we are inclined TO
think that license law could be
framed which would be superior to
prohibitory law. The superiority of pro
hibition over licence lies in the fact that the
former tends to make the liquor shops unat-
tractive and diSreputable, and consequently
the frequentiDg Of them disagreeable and
disreputable while just the opposite is the
case with license. That is, the latter tends
to make the formation of the drinking habit
easy and pleasant. while the former tends to
make it difficult and disagreeable, Neither
of them will accomplish much in the refor-
nation of old topers, or In keeping men
sober who have made up their minds to get
drunk.