MASTERTON RESTRICTED.

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2307, 14 November 1914, Page 9

MASTERTON RESTRICTED.

PROHIBITION AND ITS DEGRADATIONS NO-LICENSE DEPLORED. i (By "New Zealander.") Population is the true test of progress. Tried' by tliis, Masterton is stagnant. POPULATION UNDER LICENSING. 1906 6026 1909 .. 6500 POPULATION UNDER NO-LICENSE. 1909 5000 1913 6535

Thus under licensing Ma-sterton's population increased by nearly 10 per cent, in three years; while under NoLicense its increase was about' 1 per 200 per annum for four years I Then such persons as Mr. J. T. M. Hornsby, who expects ,to catch the Prohibition vote, and whose No-License leaflet is being widely distributed, declares that Masterton'fl progress under No-License has been"phenomenal!' Mr. Hornsby is subtle, and he may mean that such progress —21 persons per annum for four years of No-License—is phenomenal I Clever Mr.' Hornsby. The Prohibitionists will "get" that point. There is no town in New Zealand as stagnant as Masterton under No-License, unless perhaps some other No-License town. ■ MASTERTON AND CRIME: UNDER NO-LICENSE Total. Year. convictions. 1910 (first year under No-License) 178 1911, second year 183 1912, third ySaf 185 1913, fourth year .................341 These figures are from the "New Zealand Gazette" to December 31st in each year. Prohibitionists will demonstrate that there . was more drunkenness in Masterton under licensing, but it is Well known that Under No-License people drink more in their homes, and the drunkenness created by sly grog-shops is mostly covered up. Aid, like the ostrich, the Prohibitionists stick their heads into No-License sand and say drunkenness does not exist.

But here we have the Prohibitionists (ude page 43. No-License Year Book, 1914) advertising Masterton's total police offehced to be 341 for 1913 under No-License, which is over 6 per (sent, in a population of 5585: whereas the percentage of the whole Dominion is less than 2£. Social conditions have not improved in masterton under No-

License. And the Rev. Mr. Rogers, of Hinds, Ashburtoh, saj's the temptations' to drinking are greater in districts; where there are no licensed housed. But if drinking was tho cause of crime, Masterton people must be drinking more now than double the average consumption for the whole country. Even Mr. Hornsby, so muoh lauded by the Prohibitionists, says: "The Contrast between Masterton under NoLicense am} other towns where licenso exists is a revelation to me.", It must be, when there are more than double the average police offences in Masterton compared with the Whole. Dominion. MASTERTON AND' SLY GROG-' GERIES. It is notorious that the first off- ' spring of Prohibition and. IJo-Licenso is tho ! sly grog shop, with all its. abominations. /The decent people of the Masterton electorate desire to put. ah end to what No' License produces by, voting for a return to licensing, and 53 per cent, of the, voters at the last election: so voted. 'On October I9thj 1914, the "Wairarapa Age"—a newspaper fop-' rterly favourable to No-LiCense—con-tained this editorial: —

THE LIQUOR OASES. ; "Masterton is gaining an unenviable reputation throughout the Dominion on account of the. repeated prosecutions and convictions for breaohes of the liquor laws. The - legal restrictions placed upon the consumption of alcohol in .this eleo- , torate are violated with, impunity. Fines and imprisonment have been imposed time and again, but still the! illicit trade continues. The. electors shall have/an opportunity .in a few weeks' time of determining whether the present condition of, affairs shall continue. . , . The facilities for obtaining liquor are so numorous, and are so freely availed of, that the whole business has become somewhat of a farce." In the face' of all the evidence, no fair-minded person can claim that nolicense in Masterton has benefited the people iof that town. It has not progressed. Its population has not increased: it has not retained its native born. .Many people desire to leave it, because that >is made criminal in Masterton .which over an imaginary, line ia perfectly honest and reasonable. Socially, Masterton has to submit regularly to such outrages ns seldom if ever occur in licensed areas. And the morals and religious status of a population cannot be improved.by such conditions" a-s all good men,and women deplore. Masterton is, as a sample of no-license in operation, an example to be strenuously avoided.— Published by arrangement....