Windham County reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1901-1906, 1903-01-09

proposed law in Vermont provides thi.
process just like prohibition for unli
censed traffic. The actual selling, in
the absence of plea of guilty, can be
proved in either case only by witnesses,
either "spotters, observers or pur-
chasers. So, like all the arguments,
this evaporates under the light of the
slightest scrutiny. The distinction is
in fact just the other way: the viola
tions of license are made the easier to
prove because the moral sense of man
kind recognizes them to be wrong and
is willing to help punish, while the
violations of prohibition the great ma
jorty of men will twist and dodge and
skulk, and some even perjure them
selves, to screen, because, subcon-
consciously perhaps, they do not rec
ognize them to be wrong.
"A. High license in Massachusetts
increases drunkenness. - Mr. Miller
adduced the figures Of the Anti Saloon
Leagues advertisement last week
about Salem, Lowell, Plymouth, Wal
than and Fitchburg showing 1886 ar
rests in no-license year to 1927 in a
license year. Accepting these figures
uo tOllCCt3 az buCy dIb III q SCnCldi way
in places that have turned from license
to no-license, they are, especially in
the light of the figures of the whole
state, the completest possible vindica-
tion of the local option principle. They.
show that when license is abused it
brings remedy at the hands of the
people by cutting off the privilege,
that the system is one that tends TO
stimulate watchfulness of the traffic
and that when local prohibition is the
result, it is the only prohibition that
is worth anything, with an aroused pub
lie sentiment back of it, local power
instead of distant state power to en-
force it, To deny that this is the
most efficacious way of dealing
with the subject is to deny the
primary principle of American govern
ment. Indeed that was the burden of
the whole of Mr.. Miller's argument
as it is essentially of the prohibitory
idea itself-that Office holders and pros
ecuting officials in the mass are so cor
rupt and collusive with law breaking
that no law will be enforced except as
there is righteous man or two to do
the work. So far as hat is true, it is
in proportion as the duty is removed
from the direct control of the people;
otherwise there is no excuse for the
being Of republic and we would at
once better seek that righteous man in
an emperor.
But there is no excuse for Mr.. Miller
or the League in thus retailing frag-
mentary figures, when the whole truth
is of official record in Massachusetts,.
After the present law had been in oper
alton for few years and in view of an
effort to repeal it, legislative inves-
tigation took from the court records
rests for drunkenness under all the sys
.ems for 20 years, general license.
state constabulary and
ocal option. And the result was
decisive in favor of local option
80 about one-third, as | remember
i, better than any other system. Since
hat time state prohibition has been |
lead in Massachusetts. A like result !
vas shown by like inquiry in Michi-
ran. Indeed it has been almost uni
'ersally true as regards states as a /
Whole, so that out of the II states that |
Idopted prohibition when the idea was
lew and attractive II, and in side
wise way 13, have in the last % years
zone to local option and not one has
eturned from that to state prohibition.
%. High license increases the fl
ancial burdens of town and state"
nd he processes to quote Carroll ID.
Wright as saying that "for every 81
gets from saloons she
ays out $40 to care for the results of
he saloon" Col Wright said moth
ng of the kind. He was discussing
he extent of the drink evil without
articular reference to license or any
ther method of dealing with it.
Mr.. Miller admitted that there were
Effects in our prohibitory law and the
hing to do is to "amend them '--ap
arently oblivious of the fact that that
; what we have been trying to do for
} years. He likened the case to that
hen he was boy, of the hole in the
ence of his fathers farm through I
hich the cattle broke into the corn
eld, and his father told him, not to 1
vel the whole fence, but to mend the
ole To have made the illustration
omplete he should have said that that
Id brush fence had stood for 80 years,
rowing rottener every day, and the ,
attic breaking through not only every I
our but thousands of times every min ,
te, and the dad insisted on retaining ,
nd tinkering it instead of substitut
lg another kind of fence which nearly
Il farmers about him had found much
etter. :
Again, Enthusiastically, he likened !.
lie prohibitory law to sharp axe that }
aeded "only man to WELD it" to cut d.
! right. He remembered once how .
rs. Miller asked him to cut some !
ood and he promised and forgot it
I'd she scolded, not the axe, but
else.'' Well. if he had
lded that she asked his brother and
er brother, and their son, and their (
.phews and their fathers, and all !
forgot, p" or lodged or cut and run
e sensible Mrs. Miller might have |
,gun to ask if there wasn't something \
rong with the axe. Then she would c
I'VE seen that the trouble with the I
ohibitory axe, which SO per cent. of t
0 good citizens try to avoid touching Y
r its intended practical work, is that k
is not right-that for the sake of s
piping off what everybody knows
ght to be Topped off, it attacks what \
body has a right to meddle with,-
d that the true way, difficult as it T
ay be, is to draw the line between a
e two things. as local option does |;
tier than any other system yet de- 8
sed, with the least of evil and most v
good attainable, and which the Il
nding law is calculated to do better a
d more effectually than ever done h
ywhere before by any law. G
With th.e, att t,, ha