The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1900-05-22
PROHIBITION IN MAINE
Interesting Report Of an Investiga-
tion Committee.

AUBURN, Me-, May 1O.-Iast Noveu
Der, at a meeting of citizens of this CITY
and Lewiston, committee was appointed
to investigate the methods emnloved hv
the ofhcials in enforcing the prohibitorv
liquor law in the two cities and in An
droscoggin county. In it's report the COM
mittee says, in part:
We have found that the
sherln and his deputies are tender-heart
ed, ana nave no desire to persecute anv
one; that they do not want to make any
nquor seller feel that lie has been sim
Sled out for the laws assaults h,t that
II Is their fixed policy to treat all about
allke, TO raid them at irregular intervals.
anu secure evidence against them whera
p'o9i pps9,pie' so mat large number of them
sIlali be presented for trial at each term
OF court. Meantime and ali the
tlne' with almost no exception, the bus-
ness OF lquor selling goes on While the
t,quor tn dealer Is facing the Judge in court
10 receive his sentence for violating the
law of the State, his place of business is
open and his barkeepers are as busy as
usual. 90
The officers claim that the methods
lhey pursue is restricting the business
ana closing some places. All the evidence
your committee has been able to gather.
after most painstaking inyestiga tion
gees to show that the business of iiounr
seiilng is not being restricted in Andro
scogSn county; that the number of
places where liquor is sold is not being
diminished, and that within the past wear
new places have been opened Still fur
ther, it is plain that the business is not
Deing driven into the dark. Liquor sell
ing rs done openly, and bars. with their
furnishings of glasses and bottles NAV
be seen from the street
nave taken the names of fifty of the
llquor sellers of Lewiston, nearly all of
"nom nave been in business a number
of years. OF these fifty the names of
tnlrty-nlne appear on the court docket
at least once, many of them more than
once once Tor the four terms of court begin
nIng IN January, 1899. Against these
.hlrty-nlne lawbreakers there were dur
ing the four terms of court lS2 com
plants and indictments; eighty-three of
tnese were nolle pressed, seventeen were
assigned to the special docket. and thir-
teen continued for sentence which
means. me to all intents and purposes that
L., 1iS OF tnese complaints and indictments
We're brushed aside. This leaves sixty
nine cases against the thirty-nine men
uurlng the four terms of court or an av-
rag OF somewhat less than two counts
of time i'Ns III
The average total fine imposed upon
these th1rty-nine men under these sixty
nine cases during these four terms of
court was 1874, and every one of the thir-
ty-nine, with one exception Che is in
JaiD, is in business today, and, so far as
we can learn, had never been out of
business for a day during the time COW
cred by these calculations.
My attention has been repeatedly call
ed to the fact that local officers after
making raids and securing in some cases
large quantities of liquor, have found the
Grand Jury under some circumstances
unwilling to grant Indictment; and
the case, after passing through the mu-
| nlclpal court, has been dropped and the
| liquors returned. Equally suggestive is
the fact that business men, men of infiu-
ence IN the county, politically, socially,
| and, in some cases | am led to believe.
| reliSiously, stand in the way of the law S
| enforcement; stand in the way even of
| the attempts which are made to enforce
| IT, and not infrequently, by personal So
| licitation, seek to turn the officers from
| the plain path of their official duties, be-
| cause, forsooth, interference with GER
tain liquor dealers would be detrimental
| to business.
| Can we blame the officers for regard
such advice as an indication of a prevail
| ing sentiment sufficiently strong to war
! rant them in regulating their official con-
| duct by it?"