The Hawaiian gazette., 1910-05-17
JACOB f. BROWN,
Manager Hawaiian Abstract and TITLE
Company.

with your request for an expression Of
my views on the prohibition question,
1 realize the futility Of attempting to
convert any one against bis will and
how ineffective in general is any argu.
ment based on humanitarian grounds as
against arguments based on t'busi.
ness" dollars and personal gratifca.
ton. Nevertheless, mere goesl The
worst your readers can do is TO cut of
their subscriptions and take the Bull.
letin.
1 hear frequently that ''the commits
sioners are the ones to fix this thing'';
elf they would only stop the sale Of
rotten BOOZE rank poison, ETC., would
only do this and that, all would be
lovely.
AS to the quality Of the liquor con.
sumed and its departure from ideal
standards Of old Kentucky, / can not
find it in my heart to criticize the
license commissioners; their Job is q
hard one anyway, and the quality
doesn't seem TO me to "cut much ice"
in the general result. The woman who
was "hollering'' +" Haul int" the other
night at twelve O'Clock, and whose hus.
band (drunk) had been battering the
head OF her (also drunk) didn't seem
to have any distinct idea (nor did the
child who was with herr as TO whether
the difficulty had come from prime bour.
bon or dago red. It was alcohol in
some form, and it did the business, as
it has in tens of thousands of worse
cases.
have had the chance for about forty
years to observe the effect of regula-
ton Of the liquor traffic under q license
system in Hawaii. Conditions have
been worse at one time than another,
and probably the commissioners who
have held office under the present law
have done all in their power to lessen
the evils of the drink traffic and have
mitigated some of the worst. Bat the
same old story is stin told in the courts,
on the streets, and there are hidden
chapters read by but few.
One phase of the evil the commits
sioners can not reach. They may make
the saloon itself as orderly as Wednes-
day evening prayer meeting, may en-
force all the rules against screen doors,
have the prescribed distances to a foot
from school or church rigidly enforced,
but they can not prevent any man from
! walking out of the saloon with bottle
of square face that may make him
crazy and carry hell to his family. To
be Just to the license system and the
commissioners, however, l must &C.
knowledge one case where a booty,
drinking community was transformed
into sober, orderly one by the simple
process of refusing a license to the
whole island. Come to think of it, how
ever, that's a good deal like prohibit
ton and not quite the sort of license"
that the nti-prohibitionists have in
mind. License, it seems to me, has had
fair chance; would experiment with
prohibition.
t'But prohibition doesn't prohibit, >
they say. Certainly not, no prohibition
ever did absolutely, not even of
murder But it does have a moderating
effect, and that at least is desirable.
st has been a failure wherever it
has been tried. - Perhaps So and again
perhaps not. 1t seems to me that sta
tistics are favorable to the claims that
prohibition has moderated drinking and
lessened crime enormously. But one
thing is certain-it never failed in Ho,
nolulu, for it never has been tried, and
1
and expect. It will be answered that
we had prohibition once against the
sale of any liquor to Hawaiians, and
| it didn't amoun5 to- much. Very
true The prohibition that left
all the saloons running and permitted
the Hawaiian to get all the liquor he
wanted by sending some one else in
to buy it and bring it out to him,
couldn't be expected TO amount to
much, and simply emphasizes the real
difficulty-the open saloon The most
emphatic statements that prohibition
doesn't prohibit, appear to me to
come from the ones who would be most
sorry if it did. It is possible that the
wish is father to the thought.
am reminded that prohibition is
an infringement on my personal liber-
ty, on my constitutional rights-but l
have grown used to that. / am rather
fond of my personal liberty, ETC., but
I find il restricted in various ways /
can't buy little opium at the corner
drug store because it is prohibited lex
Icept on a dcctor's prescription); can u
lspeed up my new automobile as wish
to-it's prohibited; can Z even water
my lawn, build a house, change the
plumbing, or burn off the brush ON my
own land except under restrictions
made in the interest of the whole com.
munity. So think can sta ld lit
tie more in that direction if it will help
TO tighten the load of misery that falls
most heavily on the innocent.
But prohibition, say some, eds
eliminates in favor of the rich man as
against the POOR" Well, the rich man
does generally get<all the discrimina,
tion that's coming, in his ffvor, and
am sorry for IL; but ia the present
case if the result of prohibition YVES to
enable the rich man to ply himself with
liquor while the poor man was assisted
TO avoid it, / should be tempted TO
think it a case of discrimination
against the rich, and tending to even
things up. In point of fact, there il
no more discrimination" in a prohi,
bition law than in any other law of a
general character. The law that per,
mits appeals to the Supreme Court Of
the Territory or of the United States
is not discriminating one because the