Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1909-04-13
A Little Cyclone, but Twill Pass.

Nothing that has happened in con-
nection with the recent session of the
legislature has caused such storm as
that one of the last acts of the play,
when the Hastings bill, the effect Of
which would be to make Jail sentences
mandatory in convictions in liquor cases,
was passed by the legislature and vetoed
by Governor Fernald. The governor
has received really indecent abuse from
some quarters, and some of his friends
have felt sadly grieved at his action,
while others have stoutly asserted that
he is right. There are all sorts of opin-
ions. 1t was declared during the debate
that the passage of the bill would be
political suicide for the Republican
party, and now it is also declared that
the veto means political suicide for
Governor Fernald.
The Hastings bill was passed by the
votes of two classes of legislators-one
class who, like the author of the bill,
Senator Hastings, an honest, consistent
supporter of temperance and prohibition,
regarded it as a measure which would
be of great help in the suppression of
the liqu or traffic; and another class, in
Guiding Pattangsll and his followers,
who do not believe in the prohibitory
law, and voted for this bill because, as
some of them expressed it, they wanted
to make prohibition "more obnoxious
than ever" and saw chance TO play
politics.
The governor in his veto message bases
his action simply upon the general ground
that he does not believe in taking
away that discretion which the court has
to some extent in all criminal cases; and
this is certainly sound reason, even
though some feel that the discretion has
in the past been abused. But there is
another and very practical consideration
which argues against the enactment of
the Hastings bill.
Calm and sane reflection and consider
alton of the matter may bring many peo-
pie who now regret the governors action
to see that after all it is not concession
to the rum element, but that it is really
in the interest of general and thorough
enforcement.
That sturdy old temperance war horse,
Major Shorey of the Bridgton News,
whom no man ever accused of wavering
in his support of prohibition, put the
thing in a nutshell when he said in his
paper, just before the Hastings bill was
passed:
good temperance people that the Hastings bill Is
In the interest OF notification. but IL Is surely
Not that we have any objection 10 seeing the per-
sistent rumseller In jail, but we realize, a Jury
trial stands between the accused and jail sen.
fences, and failure to convict means allowing the
guilty to go scot free.
1t is Just as we'll to exercise q good de-
gree Of common sense, and face con-
ditionS, not theories. IL the passage of
this bill would put every man behind
the bars who persists in selling liquor,
every true temperance man would well
come il. But would it work that way?
Let us not be blind TO things as they
exist.
Ii is only few years since a new
county attorney in Cumberland County,
ment, had jury trials in what he con-
sidered two of his strongest liquor
cases, and failed TO secure a conviction
in either, whereupon he "threw up his
head" and continued all the liquor cases
on his docket, stating that he would
never again try liquor case before a
Cumberland County jury. This is an
extreme illustration, but is il unreason-
able to think that making Jail sentences
mandatory would make it at least very
difficult to secure conviction of liquor
seller in Cumberland County, or Andres
coggin, or Kenuebee, OF Penobscot, or
perhaps other counties of the state?
Several things stand between the accus-
ed and his sentence. One is the county
attorney; another is the jury; and if
either of these is out of sympathy with
the law, or with the severity of the law,
or feels that the sentiment of the COM
munity is out of sympathy with it, that
fact can not but have bearing upon the
result, even though men are normally
honest.
Better have law which will be fairly
well enforced-and we have law enough
now, il il is enforced-than take the
chances, by increasing the severity Of
the law, of getting it where enforcement
will be more difficult.