The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1906-04-18
NO CUPS At FOUNTAINS
Continued from Page u

] fiuence we should exert in our homes
and the community. 1t is a favorite
argument with class of self-styled
reformers that since half a loaf OF
I bread is better than none, if We car
/ not secure prohibition We should be
/ willing to compromise upon high IL
i cense. The sequence is not very clear
| but we might reply that it is poison
| and not a food that we are consider
| ing. If there is poison enough in halt
d loaf TO ruin my family. should I not
/ spurn it wholly. and use all my in
! huence TO induce my neighbors TO dc
| the same?
| But it is said with all sorts of modi-
/ fications, that very high license, say
$1,000 or more, would so reduce the
| number of saloons that it would be-
/ come temperance measure and drink
1 ing would proportionately decrease 1t
! is not true. The number of drinking
places might be diminished from 800
| to 80, but the drinking would go on all
the same On the contrary, the thirty
saloons, having now all the patronage,
could well afford to make their places
more attractive, advertise more ex-
tensively, and SO young men who would
shun a low drinking place would be
just as surely the gates of hell. As is
well known. the profits of the traffic
are so great that an increase of a few
hundred dollars on the license of a
well-esta blished saloon is not depre-
Gated. but rather desired by the
keeper, since it gives him larger pat
ronage.
High license as the term is now used.
meaning license of $1,000 or over. was
first introduced by H. N Hardy, mayor
of Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1879. He was
strong temperance man, and being
compelled by the laws to grant liquor
licenses, determined that the license
should be so high that but few could
pay it. In this. he was encouraged by
the temperance people. Last Decem-
Der. twenty-six years later, in letter
Mr.. Hardy says: High license had
never been tried before anywhere in
the world as far as we knew. We in
troduced il and il reduced the number
Of our saloons from twenty-five to five.
but it did not reduce the number of
drunkards the least bit. 1t only made
saloonkeepers add numerous attrac
tons to their establishments and dou-
bic their efforts to secure custom.
Moreover, the high license saloonkeeper
violates all the restrictive features of
the license, like all other liquor
sellers"
Let us not then be deceived by the
statement that high license, by de-
creasing the number of saloons, will
diminish drunkenness and other evils
attending liquor selling. If there We're
ten dry goods stores in a town and
five OF them should be closed, the needs
of the community would be the same
and the remaining five stores would
have all the trade
With many the chief argument in
favor of high license is the increased
revenue brought into the treasury of
the government. But it has been
clearly shown that the revenue dulls
the public consumer to the evils of the
traffic. ''All the brewers and distillers
favor high license, knowing that it is
the buffer between themselves and
prohibition" The saloonkeeper only
advances the money to the govern
nent, while his customers pay back
many times the tax by the increased
cost of their drinks. Moreover, since it |
is well known that fully seventy-five |
per cent of all crime comes from the |
use of liquor, the increased cost OF |
police and courts and prisons made |
necessary by the saloon must many |
times exceed all the revenue derived |
from any license that has ever been |
demanded.
We are naturally suspicious of any
scheme which our enemies approve and |
it is well known that liquor manufac- |
turers and dealers usually favor high |
license. In Nebraska, where the Ii
cense fee is $1,000, the president of a
large distiIling company says: The
high license law of Nebraska is the
grandest law for the liquor traffic
there isl MARY S. WHITNEY.