The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1902-02-15
WRINKLES OF REFORM.

British refornerS are half way to the
temperance saloon, but still retain al
cohol subsidiary agent in the hgh'
with intemperance. How this is done
is described by a writer in the Boston
Transcript as follows: This drinking
place will be managed by a man who
will have no interest whatever in push
ing the sale of alcoholic beverag es. but
who will have a direct pecuniary inter-
est in getting people to take non-alco-
holic drinks, because upon the latter,
in addition to his fixed salary, he will
get a generous commission. He will
also have an inducement to push the
sale Of food, for this department of the
business will be entirely his own ven
ture. and to his own private purse will
accrue all that can be made out of it.
The slum public has hitherto been un-
cleanly. 1t has been a place where
filthy language could be heard, and
where the landlord would have every
incentive to encourage excess, and to
break the law which forbids the selling
of liquor to children and drunkards.
But under the Peoples Refreshment
House Association all these features
will be changed. The occasional uneX-
pected visit of an inspector will insure
scrupulous cleanliness, and also that
the atmosphere is kept as pure as pos
sibie morally, and that none of the re-
strictive features of the license laws
are broken. Tea, coffee and cocoa will
be obtainable at all hours, and these
with other temperance beverages, will
be kept to the front. Always, too. there
will be cool water on the counter for
public service without cost. All the
same, this house, like the others man
aged by this reform association, will
keep in stock every kind of liquor and
beer, and the manager and his bar
maids will serve the same to all com
ers of proper age who do not give evil
dence of inebriety. They will be oDlig-
ed to do this. just as other publicans
are. by the provisions of their license.
Naturally one wonders to what ex-
tent, If at all, these changes will re-
duce the consumption of alcoholic bev-
erages. This is a point which the ex-
perience of this association, so far as
it has gone. has not clearly settled. Ex-
periments at the three reformed houses
first tackled is rather against the
theory of reduction than in favor of 1t.
The first was a dirty place, and being
frightened up, it drew more custom
In the second case no custom was lost
through the change. In the third case
there was a falling-off, due to a more
aggressive bid for patronage on the
part of public houses in the same
neighborhood that were run on the old
lines. This looks rather ominous. But
the movement is perhaps not far enough
along to permit clear judgment, and
meanwhile it is surely some gain to de-
cency and sobriety to have better man
agement of such places, to have the
law rigidly kept, and to know that the
profits are for the benefit of the many
in public improvements rather than for
the enrichment of the few.
"One thing, at any rate, has been
demonstrated, and that is that public
houses run on this reform basis can be
depended upon to yield both the five
percent guaranty to shareholders and
the five per cent for the sinking fund.
The Peoples Refreshment House AS
ISOLATION, though it has been at work
but four years, is annually meeting
these drafts, and it still, for two years
past, has had a surplus of about $500 a
year for distribution to public objects"