We have now reached a point at which we may properly recur to a topic already suggested and inquire a little more carefully into the actual working of the prohibitory laws. On this head we shall confine ourselves chiefly to the testimony of men who have made the matter a thorough study, and that not at a distance, but in the very midst of the operation of such laws, and as Maine is the state which led the way in the prohibitory movement and has since followed that course with most persistency, it is proper that it should occupy most of our attention during the inquiry.
Not long ago a number of the most prominent men of the state, men of different political parties, wholly above reproach, and especially fitted by official position or private observation to form a just opinion in the premises, became so well convinced of the evils of the present system, and its detrimental effect on the people, as to unite in an effort for its amendment. Their movement took form in the presentation by Mr. Fox of Portland, a lawyer of high reputation and a member of the Legislature, of the following proposed Act:
“State of Maine, 1879.
“An Act in relation to Cider, Native Wines, Ale, Porter, Lager Beer and Malt Liquors.
“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in Legislature assembled, as follows:
“Cider, Native Wine, Ale, Porter, Lager Beer and other Malt Liquors, when pure and unadulterated, shall not be considered intoxicating liquors within the meaning of the laws of this State.”
The bill was referred to the Committee on Temperance and able arguments in its favor were made by Gen. Gorham, L. Boynton, Hon. Nathan Webb and C. G. Yeaton, all men highly respected by the people of the state, of the strictest integrity, and with no inducement to make other than an impartial statement. Three gentlemen who have successively held the office of county attorney of Cumberland county for about fifteen years past and who are all Republicans, have unanimously testified against the present prohibition law. They are Gen. Chas. T. Matlock, C. F. Libby, Esq., and Nathan Webb. Similar views are held by such men as Gen. W. S. Tilton of Logan Springs, Judge Goddard, postmaster of Portland, M. P. Frank of Portland, Speaker of the House, Dr. Edw. Dana and many other influential citizens. No party, however, was willing to go to the people on this issue and the bill failed to pass, although there is good reason to hope that when the next attempt is made some who have previously upheld the present law will have learned to take a different view. Much new light is constantly thrown on the influence of the present statute, and can hardly fail to produce an adequate effect. A minority report of the committee was presented and contains so much of interest and importance that we cannot do better than to reproduce it in these pages. Its statements are those of men who understand the subject of which they treat and are worth a careful reading.
“The Committee on Temperance have listened to the able and exhaustive arguments presented on both sides of the matter in hearing, and the minority of said committee respectfully present their views in dissent from the report of the majority. The law regulating the sale of intoxicating liquors, commonly known as the prohibitory liquor law has had a trial of more than a quarter of a century. Its severity has no parallel in the laws of any other civilized country. Although enforced with all the power of the state, court records show that the number of prosecutions and convictions is increasing, at great expense to the tax payers. Country towns pay their share for the enforcement of this law in cities without corresponding benefit to themselves. The cost of its execution is a burden on an over-taxed people. A detailed statement which is hereto annexed shows the cost for officers to enforce the law.”
The details are here omitted but “the total reaches the enormous amount of $220,000. The records of the Insane Hospital show a gradual increase of patients caused by excessive use of intoxicating liquors. At the present time that institution has nearly double the number of inmates from that cause alone, which it had when the present prohibitory law was enacted. While the law, with singular inconsistency, does not recognize pure and beneficial kinds of intoxicating liquors as property when intended for sale by other than city or town agencies, and makes no distinction between the sale of adulterated liquors and pure liquors, it authorizes their indiscriminate sale in numerous city and town agencies. Liquor-drinking is not done openly to so great an extent but the consumption is as large. It is notorious that quantities of strong liquors have for years been transported into the state from the Provinces, and especially from Massachusetts, which has drained us of millions of dollars which might have been kept at home under liberal laws. Liquor runners from New York and Boston penetrate every nook and corner of our state to rob our people and eat out their substance. Liquors are also imported in bond, and under the protection of the Federal Government they cannot be seized in bulk. They are consumed in families and in club-rooms which have been organized in large towns and cities, under that most dangerous guise of social drinking. The liquor agencies authorized by law have vended in some years more than a hundred thousand dollars worth of liquors for medicinal, mechanical and manufacturing purposes only, as is supposed. We consider these liquor agencies as leeches upon the people. The question is whether a law, the severity of which is without example, having failed to accomplish the ends for which it was designed, according to experience and the testimony of officials serving under it, who with singular unanimity give their verdict against it, ought to be so amended that cider, native wines, ale, porter and particularly lager beer, shall not be considered within the meaning of the statute.
“History shows that every nation has its peculiar stimulants in stronger or milder forms. Men crave stimulant. It is an undeniable fact, both in the light of history and experience, that in countries like Germany, France, etc., whose climate is not unlike ours, drunkenness is known scarcely more than the strong liquors which cause it. Cheap light wines and nutritious malt beverages supersede strong drink. Everybody uses them at his meals and as a common beverage. The people of those countries are among the healthiest, happiest, most prosperous and temperate on the face of the globe. We appeal to the wisdom of this Legislature and the consideration of the people whether it would not promote the cause of temperance and the material welfare of our state to give the amendment proposed a fair trial. It would tend to promote harmony by removing an irritating and festering sore from our politics. Good citizens without distinctions of party view with alarm the inroads that this law in its operation is working upon our social and material interest, driving away business, depreciating real estate, shackling enterprise, cheating labor, increasing taxes, educating intolerance and hypocrisy, influencing elections and encouraging bribery and perjury and the clandestine compounding, sale and use of poisonous liquors.”
Darius H. Ingraham of Portland.
Gorham L. Boynton of Bangor.
F. B. Farrel of Van Buren.
Arthur Moore of Machiasport.
This is the statement of men whose characters stand so high as to give great weight to their opinion and leave nothing to be objected to their statement of fact.
Again, Governor Garcelon is not a man to make hasty or unfounded statements in an important matter and he has been for many years an eminent physician of large practice and a close observer of the habits of the people. But read this summary of an address delivered by him before the Maine temperance convention: “He called attention to various kinds of intemperance, which have generally escaped the notice of reformers in that state. He spoke of the use of tobacco as an increasing evil, especially among the young, and said that in addition to chewing and smoking, snuff-dipping was becoming prevalent, a fact of which many are ignorant and which excites surprise. The use of opiates, Governor Garcelon remarked, had increased to an alarming extent. Many a man, he said, had appeared upon the stand advocating temperance, who had in his pocket a bottle of laudanum or black drops, which pave the way to an early grave. The ladies carry chloroform and ether to moisten the handkerchief with which to allay nervous excitement. As a practicing physician and observer of human nature, he placed all these forms of intemperance in the same category with the intemperate use of spirituous liquors, all of which demand correction. Is the change from the intoxicating liquors to opium an improvement? Governor Garcelon has, undoubtedly, done the people a timely service by directing attention to this and other evils, and if followed up it will be found that the ‘Maine Law’ has not been the grand instrument of reform which it is claimed to be.”
At a convention held at Bangor, Me., July 1, 1879, a resolution in favor of local option was presented by Mr. Charles F. Swett, a considerable part of whose speech is here reproduced, as it deals in facts of great importance to the present discussion:
“In supporting this measure, I wish to distinctly define my position. I am a practical temperance man; a total abstainer. I have belonged, and do now belong, to every temperance organization in the state of Maine, except the Reform Club. I have had much experience in endeavoring to ‘reclaim the fallen and save others from falling,’ and I therefore claim to be as conversant with the practical workings of our prohibitory law as any man in this hall, and I declare, from my experience, that that law, so far as it contributes to lessening the evils of intemperance, is a complete failure, and a costly one to the people of this state. * * * In Cumberland county there are four deputy sheriffs, whose business it is to enforce the liquor law. These men get from $7,000 to $9,000 per year for their services. Of course they never reform a drunkard, but they can afford to contribute $3,000 a year towards the campaign fund—and they do—and the people furnish the money. Every liquor-seller thrown into jail for sixty days pays the high sheriff a profit of $1.50 per week. When there is an average of say fifty of these cases his profits will be $4,000 per year, from this source alone. The people furnish the money, and the sheriff ‘comes down handsomely’ for the campaign fund. True, there are no men reformed, but the party gets the ‘sinews of war.’ And so it is all over the state.
“The cost of the execution of the prohibitory law is a burden upon our over-taxed people. The report of the temperance committee of our last Legislature showed that although the ‘law was enforced with all the power of the state,’ court records prove that the number of prosecutions is annually increasing, at great expense to the tax payers. From June 1, 1877, to June 1, 1878, the cost of enforcing the prohibitory law, in Cumberland county alone, reached $28,000. In the same ratio, applied to the population of the whole state, the cost reaches the enormous sum of $220,000, annually. But we would not complain of the expenditure even of this vast sum if the results were, in any degree satisfactory. But they are not. The advocates of the Maine law make bold claims, but their claims are not substantiated by the facts. Outside of Maine, and even in the back towns of this state, remote from the cities, people are given to understand that liquor is not sold in Maine, and therefore there is less crime here than formerly. Neal Dow says, ‘We have little crime here because we have banished its cause.’ Let us look at the facts. In 1851, there were 87 convicts in the state prison. We had then a population of 584,000, while to-day it is probably 625,000. Last year’s state prison report shows the number of convicts to be 206, while 69 more were serving in jail work-shops. So the number of convicts has increased, under the prohibitory law, over threefold, while our population has remained comparatively the same. Does that speak well for prohibition? Now, take the city of Portland. In 1856, there were 650 arrests for drunkenness, in a population of 27,000. In 1876, twenty years later, with a population of about 30,000, there were 1800 arrests for drunkenness, and in no year of the last eight has the list fallen below 1,200. And this under a vigorous enforcement of the prohibitory law. Does that speak well for prohibition? During last week, over 200 barrels of liquor were brought into Portland, by the various railroads and steamboats, for home consumption. Does that speak well for prohibition?
“The secret drinking in club-rooms in Portland is threefold that which formerly took place at open bars, while the traffic outside has been driven into worse and worse hands every year, until it has, with a few exceptions, been taken away from respectable men, whose interest it would be to conduct it with some show of decency, and given into the undivided management and control of the low and criminal, so that while ‘the law is enforced with all the power of the state,’ the upper classes get drunk at the club-rooms, and the lower classes get drunk at the shops in the slums. Does that speak well for prohibition? The vilest liquors possible to make are manufactured for the market in this state, and even our state liquor agent could not, or did not, keep pure liquors even for medicinal purposes.
“Private club-rooms have multiplied in Portland, under the operation of the prohibitory law, (there being over 80 in that city at the present time,) and our young men just starting out in life are exposed to all the dangers of the drunkard’s life, and no law can stop them. In these club-rooms, boys who would never go to saloons to get drunk, who would never learn to gamble were it not for their club-room temptations, who would, in short, grow up honest and respected citizens, are being ruined every day. This evil ought to be remedied by prompt and decisive action. Fathers who love their sons; mothers who pray for their boys; sisters who mourn over their disgraced brothers; wives who weep over the wreck of what were once good men and true husbands; citizens who care for the good name and prosperity of their communities, ought to labor to shut these accursed gates of hell! Let us commence the good work by striving to repeal the prohibitory law, which is a positive detriment to the cause of temperance, an incubus upon the mercantile interests of Maine, and a curse to the young men of our cities.”
In Massachusetts we have very important testimony to the same effect, a part of which is very ably and carefully summarized in an article which we insert here, retaining for convenience a portion at the beginning which might equally well be placed under a different heading:
“The state Board of Health of Massachusetts, in the Tenth Annual Report, published in January, 1879, say, under the head of ‘Intemperance’: ‘A more severe public judgment of drunkenness, in recent times, has undoubtedly tended to very much decrease its prevalence; and it is generally believed that light German beer is used more and more each year, at least in our state, to the exclusion of stronger liquors—a change which it is of course desirable to hasten by legislation, so far as that can be done, either by removal of restrictions on the sale of mild liquors, and heavily taxing the stronger spirits, or by any other just and proper means.’ This is the reiterated public expression of men to whom the state of Massachusetts has committed the general care for the health of her people. For the former public utterance of this opinion the chairman of the Board, for years past, has been most bitterly assailed by prohibitionists; but, undaunted by these intemperate and abusive attacks, the state Board of Health confirm the statement of their honest conviction by repeating the same, and embodying it in an important public document.
“In harmony with this public expression of opinion by the state Board of Health, appears the action of the Committee on License of the Board of Aldermen of the city of Boston. In their report of September, 1878, to the City Council, this committee say: ‘It may be objected that the committee have been too liberal in their recommendations of the issue of licenses, but their experience has convinced them that the “lunch rooms,” established chiefly for the sale of lager beer and edible refreshments, ought to be regarded as victualing saloons, even if facilities are not maintained for regular meals, and no cooking is done on the premises. The committee feel satisfied that the consumption of lager beer, now so general, tends, in fact, to exclude from sale and use more ardent spirits, and thereby diminishes crime and pauperism. It is well known that in the old countries, where beer and light wines are accessible, without restraint, at a small expense, and are freely used by all classes of people, cases of intoxication are very rare. The committee are confident that drunkenness, and consequently pauperism and crime, will be diminished in this state, if no restrictions were placed on the sale of lager beer, for it then could be provided at such a low price as to effectually supersede the use of strong liquors. They therefore submit for the consideration of the City Council the following order:
“‘Ordered, That his Honor the Mayor be requested to petition the next Legislature for such amendment of chapter 99 of the statutes of 1875 as will allow the sale of cider and lager beer without any license being required therefor.’
“It must be admitted, that in the state of Massachusetts, the liquor question has been as fully discussed, and the various legal expedients connected therewith have had as fair and full a trial as in any other state in the Union. It may therefore be claimed, without presumption, that to the results there attained, and the opinions there formed, when coming from official and authentic sources, the careful consideration of other state governments should be given. Acting from this view, we draw the attention of the reader to a very instructive report of the results of an investigation relative to drunkenness and liquor selling under prohibition and license legislation contained in the Tenth Annual Report of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor, issued as a public document in January, 1879. This investigation was undertaken at the special request of Governor Rice, whose object was to place on record a statement, as a basis for an intelligent consideration of the question, of as reliable a character as could be secured by impartial statistics. These statistics are drawn from official sources, and, as far as the figures are concerned, are thoroughly reliable.
“The years 1874 and 1877 were selected for comparison, because 1874 represented the last full year under the operation of the prohibitory law, and 1877 the last full year under the license law. The advantages resulting from this selection of years, if any, are on the side of the prohibitory law, because that law, in 1874, had been in operation for a number of years, while the license law, in 1877, had only been in force a year and a half.
“Four circulars were prepared and addressed by the chief of the state Bureau of Statistics and Labor to town clerks, city clerks, chiefs of police, to standing justices, clerks of district, municipal and police courts, and trial justices. These circulars solicited information regarding the sales of liquor, prosecutions therefor, and arrests and convictions for drunkenness for the prohibitory year 1874 and the license year 1877. The completeness of the investigation may be seen from the following statement:
“Circular ‘A’ was sent to 325 Town Clerks; 322 answered.
“Circular ‘B’ was sent to 19 City Clerks; 19 answered.
“Circular ‘C’ was sent to 19 Chiefs of Police; 19 answered.
“Circular ‘D’ was sent to 132 Court and Trial Justices; 130 answered.
“This is a total of 490 returns of 495 circulars of inquiry sent out. There can be no question that the investigation was exhaustive, for the few towns which did not answer are unimportant places. From the information thus obtained and tabulated in detail in the Report, the following totals are derived:
| ARRESTS FOR DRUNKENNESS. | |
|---|---|
| Under the prohibitory law, 1874, | 28,044 |
| Under the license law, 1877, | 20,657 |
| CONVICTIONS FOR DRUNKENNESS. | |
| Under the prohibitory law, 1874, | 23,981 |
| Under the license law, 1877, | 17,862 |
| NUMBER OF PLACES WHERE LIQUOR WAS ILLEGALLY SOLD. | |
| Under the prohibitory law, 1874, | 5,609 |
| NUMBER OF PLACES LICENSED TO SELL LIQUOR. | |
| Under the license law, 1877, | 5,273 |
| JUDGMENTS ON COMPLAINTS FOR ILLEGAL SALES. | |
| Under the prohibitory law, 1874, | 3,644 |
| Under the license law, 1877, | 1,693 |
“It will thus be seen that the number of arrests for drunkenness under the operation of the license law, during the year 1877, as compared to the prohibitory year 1874, shows a decrease of fully twenty-five per cent. In the number of convictions for drunkenness the difference in favor of the license year is at the same rate. The number of places where liquor was illegally sold under the prohibitory law of 1874, was larger by 336 than the number of places licensed in 1877. It is evident from these returns that the prohibitory law has failed to prohibit, or even to regulate, the sale of liquor, while it is equally apparent that the license law, as a legislative measure, not only regulates the sale of liquor, but decreases drunkenness.
“A law, to be effective, must have the support of the people; the prohibitory law will never be thus supported, as common sense will teach that it is neither just nor judicious, to make somebody else than the drunkard himself responsible for his failing; and is not just this the questionable theory upon which prohibition is based?
“The prohibitionists condemn the use of alcoholic beverages of every kind, as the prolific source of sin and vice. Nothing less than total abstinence finds favor with them. To them, the terms use and abuse have no distinctive meaning, and their curse falls upon brewery and distillery alike. It must be admitted that as long as alcoholic stimulants are used, intemperance will exist, and that the evil of drunkenness will only disappear with their total suppression. In view of the actual state of social habits, and the position which alcoholic beverages hold in civilized life, as now constituted, no sane person will believe such a total suppression possible. There are no means by which a habit, transmitted from generation to generation, and forming so important an element in the development of the civilization of the human race, can be uprooted. Alcoholic stimulants once invented are never again abandoned, and seem to be destined to co-exist with man. The deplorable vice of drunkenness has always accompanied their use, and all attempts of rulers and philanthropists, the severest penalties and the sincerest compassion, have alike failed to suppress the evil. But it does not follow that, because the temptation of excessive use is too strong for some to be resisted, the great mass of people, who can and do use these beverages in moderation, should be made responsible for the weakness of the few. Nor does it follow that the intensity of the temptation is to be regarded as an excuse for the drunkard. Excess in the gratification of a desire, however natural, to the injury of others, is to be condemned morally and legally. Many actions of man, which the moral and legal code of society brands as a crime, and punishes as such, are the result of an inordinate gratification of instinctive desires implanted by nature, upon the proper indulgence of which the very propagation and the happiness of the human race depends, as for example, the instinct of self-preservation, of procreation and of acquisition. The more civilization advances, the more moral and intellectual discernment governs natural impulse, the less excess in the use of alcoholic stimulants the world will see. The vice of intemperance prevails to a far greater extent among the ignorant and uneducated than among the cultured classes of society. The spread of culture and education will do far more for temperance than the indiscriminate prohibition of the sale of alcoholic stimulants and the signing of pledges; it will divest the indulgence of the social cup of vulgarity, and will punish immoderation by social ostracism; by giving to the pleasure of exhilaration an ideal character, it will make the vine and the hop the emblems of harmless enjoyment. A clearer perception thus establishes a standard of ethics, which recognizes a proper gratification of the innate craving for enjoyment and exhilaration, as an essential to human happiness, but draws the line between what is permissible and what is not, between the becoming and the unbecoming. The craving for improvement of condition and for enjoyment is strongly developed in man—happily for him, for it is the very spur that urges him on to the physical improvement which is the necessary concomitant of mental advance. The love for exhilarating stimulants is but one phase of this craving. As such it is entitled to and has found recognition in our social laws, and the temperate use of alcoholic beverages is sanctioned by a practice as wide-spread as civilization itself, and by all classes, whatever their station or condition in life. Contravening legal statutes will always be found either wholly inoperative, or to fall far short of the intended effect. Whenever and wherever the temporary enforcement of a law prohibiting the manufacture and sale of such beverages has taken place, the cure, as far as the suppression of stimulants is concerned, has generally proved worse than the disease.”
The following particulars, taken from the report under the title of “Nativity of Prisoners,” given by the Chief of the Police of Boston, become very interesting when considered in reference to the usual drink of the classes mentioned. The table shows first the number in Boston of Irish and Germans, the number of prisoners of each nation and the percentage of prisoners to the whole population:
| Population. | No. of Prisoners. | Percentage of Prisoners to the Population. | |
| Irish | 56,900 | 14,673 | 25.78 |
| German | 5,606 | 364 | 6.49 |
Similar general results are found more or less marked wherever such laws are in force. Druggists tell us that as a rule the consumption of opium in various forms from paregoric to laudanum has increased, bitters are more extensively used and in some places Scotch snuff for “dipping” has come into demand. The amount of opium annually imported is greater than that received by China a hundred years ago, and there is reason to suppose that many who are called reformed drunkards have adopted opium in some form and thus given themselves to a new bondage no whit better than the old. Notice that the increase in the sale of opium keeps pace in a very fair measure with the enforcement of prohibitory laws. One dealer in drugs in Hartford, Conn., recently advertised for sale five thousand pounds of opium, certainly a good dose for the land of steady habits. In the state just mentioned both prohibition and “local option” laws have been tried and neither can be considered a success. Under the present “local option” many towns wholly forbid the sale of spirituous and malt liquors, and this fact has given great prominence to suits arising out of the sale of what is called Schenck beer, which is substantially lager beer. The courts at last decided that this article is not intoxicating within the meaning of the act, and though the decision as to intoxicating quality is just, the fact that this beer is allowed while lager beer under its own name is forbidden shows how great a part prejudice instead of reason has played in the contest. “Peripatetic gin mills” are increasing in about the same ratio as “temperance societies” and “temperance detectives.” Those who pass by the name of temperance reformers seem in many cases to lose the sense of human charity and brotherly kindness, and little else can be expected when we remember how often they are the slaves of this single idea and how in all ages of the world bigotry has been attended by cruelty. Before giving one striking instance of cruelty which it is to be hoped has since been sincerely regretted by all concerned, we must reiterate that any law which every one knows to be constantly violated brings law into disrespect and demoralizes the community so far forth. The case to which reference was just made was mentioned in the New York World, and although other matters are added the whole is of sufficient interest to bear reproduction. The article is as follows:
“Some time last September an old lady by the name of Stack who kept a farm at Northfield, Vt., sold two glasses of cider to a man by the name of Timothy Hogan, who informed against her and secured her conviction and a fine of $20 and expenses. In consideration of her age, sickness and poverty, she was allowed a short time to pay her fine, but not being prepared with the cash in January, she was arrested by Deputy Sheriff Avery, and, notwithstanding the severity of the weather, hauled off to prison in an open sleigh to Montpelier insufficiently clad. While in confinement sickness and poor treatment combined caused a rapid decline, until her niece, a domestic in a hotel, borrowed sufficient money to pay her fine and effect her release. Her death followed shortly afterward, caused, no doubt, by the treatment she had received. This at the hand and in the cause of philanthropic reformers is bad enough, but worse remains. Here is a temperance man’s description of the system by which these reformers are guided, and which one of our conscientious judges in Connecticut not long since truly denounced as infamous. The state referred to is the state of the ‘Green Mountain Boys,’ and noble Ethan Allen—Vermont. The manner of prosecuting liquor cases is by what is known as the ‘spy system.’ Every informer who can secure the conviction of any person receives a portion of the fine imposed. A respectable justice of the municipal court in one of the most important towns in the state is authority for the statement that there are certain justices of the peace who make a special arrangement with these informers and come in for a share of the profits, so that outside of the merits of the case conviction is a foregone conclusion every time. The prohibitory law in force in this state makes it a crime for a man to sell even a glass of cider. In the past few weeks the World correspondent has visited Rutland, Burlington, St. Albans, Montpelier and other towns in the state, and found in every place that at the hotels and elsewhere liquor was sold and no questions asked. In this, as in every other state, where a similar law has been in force, people with money and influence can freely engage in the traffic with none to molest or make them afraid. The class of spies or informers who engage in the work of prosecuting liquor cases are the lowest people in the community. They are despised by everybody except fanatical temperance reformers, who employ and encourage them. A prominent citizen, who has held high office in the state and is one of the substantial business men, said the other day: ‘The result of the prohibitory law has been to honey-comb the social community with hypocrisy and immorality. I have closely investigated the course of events since this “temperance wave” has swept the state, and while drunkenness is not on the decrease other forms of immorality are certainly on the increase. I would not permit my daughter, or any respectable young lady over whom I might have any influence, to even attend the evening meetings of these temperance societies, as I think it has been conclusively proved that they promote immorality.’ Such a statement coming from an influential and respected citizen, who himself practices and inculcates temperance principles, shows the tendency of the prohibitory movement in this state.”
It would be an easy matter to collect volumes of evidence on this question of the real effect of prohibitory laws, all going to show that they do not prevent intemperance, that they do lead to the use of other stimulants, that they undermine the character of the community, and that, from whatever point of view regarded, they must be considered harmful to the individual and to the state. Enough, however, for our present purpose and for the space at command has been already said. Those best informed will be most ready to say that the presentation above given does not overstate, but rather falls short of displaying the corruption that creeps in where a prohibitory law is in force.