New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1914-07-11
FOUND MAINE SOBER!
A Friend of Prohibition Has Memoir.
able Experience in the Pine Tree State

To the Editor of The Tribune.
Sir; In your editorial in to-day's
papcr on Prohibitions Weak Spot"
you quote Maine as ''the classic exam
pie of the failure of statewide prohibi
ton" II is indeed classic example,"
Mr.. Editor. for | have heard of it ever
since | can remember. But | have also
heard it stoutly maintained by men Of
the highest repute that the example
teaches exactly the opposite lesson;
and so last fall, in view of an approach
ing local option campaign you believe
in local option, | gather from the clos
ing paragraph of your editorial / went
TO the State Of Maine to see for myself,
and spent two weeks there, in Portland,
in Bath, in Rockland and in some Of
the country between.
For one week Of this time ] was ac-
companied by an ex-hotelkeeper, VINO
was very anxious TO show me the
worst. In Portland | had as a guide a
man VINO was thoroughly familiar with
excise conditions, and everywhere
talked with men of all classes and con-
ditions. the friends and the foes of
prohibition, and everywhere | visited
all sections Of the community-in the
towns on foot-and everywhere the re-
suit was the same.
Ny hotel friend rallied at the law and
tried again and again to get drink"
but the best and the worst he got was
capsicum s0dal In Portland saw
the places where booze" was to be had
by those who could give the counter
sign. Before every one of them stood
fellow holding up the hitching post
or the telephone pole, and keeping a
weather eye open for deputy sheriirs.
If had been an initiate, so | was told,
| would have been ushered into an in
nerfroom and left there while the pro-
prietor retired to the ash barrel to re-
turn with a solitary bottle and dole me
out a drop or two, extremely careful
that his patron shouldn't get too much
and give him away. At any rate, in all
my stay in Maine ! never saw man
intoxicated, never saw a person in the
slightest degree under the influence of
liquor. never smelled the stuff on
anybody.
This may be a remarkable experience
in your estimation, so different from
that of the visitors" you have heard
from heretofore. But, in my estimation,
the explanation is simple enough
those visitors to Maine who have "for
over a generation exclaimed over pub
lie spectacles of drunkenness practi-
cally unrivalled elsewhere" are very
much like the Greeks exclaiming over
the pigs Of Circe's Stand.
1t is true, of course, that there have
been extreme variations in the enforce
ment OF Names prohibtory law; but
the consensus of opinion among the
citizens OF the state, as found il, was
to the effect that even during the most
lax periods Maine was much better off
than any of the neighboring license
states. This. too, for fifty years has
been the verdict at the polls. the light
vote Of the last contest being due to
overconfdence on the part Of thousands
of friends of prohibition among the
farmers busy with harvest. II is very
+ significant also that. whatever may
have been the experience of the Wis
iiCrs who talk OF the classic example,"
there are boys and girls in the public
schools Of Maine. even in Portland,
who have never seen drunken man.
There are blind tigers" in Maine