Arizona republican., 1911-04-09

| Cidflng lndI TOT more sAan lWenlN
 years there was practically no dis
 turbance in the substantially open dis
 regard for the prohibition law. That | is to say,' Mir. Day writes. every hotel in the State of Maine had prac- l tically an open bar. There were, for l instance. in the city of Lewiston, of some 25.O00 inhabitants, one hundred i to one hundred and fifty saloons that
 were practically open saloons" The authorities paid no attention to these
 saloons except to raid them at regular | intervals of about six months and i'm
 pose a fine The defendants paid this | fine without protest, and continued to sell liquor without further mOlestatiOn. Mir. Day declares that in those days | the liquor interests were perfectly | happy in Maine: that "a man needed only a guarantee from the sheriff and
 enough to buy a few bottles of cheap whisky and a chance to horse up
 keg of beer He was under no moral
 nor legal responsibility whatever-no
 bonds, no license-and sold to the
 worst ssot to get his ten cents even If his family had complained. because | he knew he was under no respOnsibil- | ity to conform to State laws as he would have been. for example. in New Hampshire, where they have license requirements The sheriff in some counties" MT Day declares. made
 money very easily and rapidly by this
 system
 But an attempt was made to change this state of affairs by Governor Cobb | in 1904. He set out to enforce pro- hibition. One result was that when the Governor came up for reelection | his plurality fell from 27,0OO to | bare 1000. The Chairman of the State Republican Committee himself de clared to Mir. Day that the results showed that the people of the State of Maine want prohibition, but do not want it enforced"
 Meantime Mir Cobbs efforts re- suited merely in the closing of the more respectable bars in hotels and clubs. their places being taken by bars of the most disreputable char acter. In Lewiston, for example, the Mayor caused the police to investi- gate. with the result of showing that more than two hundred kitchen dives" were selling the most villainous compounds.
 That this was typical is sufficiently attested by the words of Ex-Governor Cobb himself who, in an interview with Mir Day, summed up the results of his efforts in these words: lf l. for the social, economic and moral benefit of the rising generation of the State of Maine. were to choose be- tween the enforcement of prohibition as I have been able to enforce 1t with my best effore" (and never any man put forth such efforts); If l were to choose between prohibition as I have been able to enforce 1t, and selling rum as freely as sugar over
 the counter of my store, l would unhesitatingly declare for free rum
 concomitant Evils of Prohibition.
 From whatever standpoint we view the matter, then. we find no evidence that the prohibition laws have in the past been effective in diminishing the consumption of alcoholic bever- ages. But the mere failure to inhibit the use of liquor does not tell the en- tire story It is impossible for any one who has studied the effects of the various prohibition experiments in detail to avoid the conclusion that positive evils have in many cases resulted from prohibitory legislation. The character of these evils has, per haps. nowhere been more clearly and succinctly stated than by the impar- tial witnesses of the Committee of Fifty. who, summarizing the results of their investigation of the subject. conducted in the early 90s, make the following assertion:
 "There have been concOmitant evils of prohibitory legislation. The efforts to enforce it during forty years past have had some unlOOked-fOr effects on public respect for courts, judicial pro cedure. oaths and law in general, and for officers of the law, legislators and public servants. The public have seen law defied, a whole generation ot habitual lawbreakers schOOled in evas- ion and shamelessness. courts inef- fective though fluctuations of policy. delays perjuries, negligences and oth- CT miscarriages of justice. officers of the law double-face and mercenary. legislators timid and insincere. candi- dates for office hypOcritical and truck lB. pledges and to reasonable public eX- pectation. Through an agitation which has always had a moral end. these immOralities have been devel- oped and made conspicuous
 The ExpediI ncy of Universal Prohibit
 ton.
 It should be stated that many ar dent advocates of prohibition admit that even State wide prohibition can not produce the desired results so long as surrounding States allow the manufacture of alcoholic beverages which may then be imported into re- stricted territory They affirm that prohibition will not really be tested until the entire territory of the coun- try is placed under similar restric- tions.
 This brings us to what seems to me the most important aspect of the pro hibition prOblem-the question. name lv. of the eXpediency of National pro- hibition: that being the goal toward which all the effort of the past fifty years has trended. But here obviously we are shifted from the realm of his ! tory to that of prophecy. State wide | hoe baar tria6 with results