BOTTLE LICENSES.

Evening Star, Issue 4143, 7 June 1876, Page 3

BOTTLE LICENSES.

_ fbltoAMir. Sftu —It was with considerable surprise that I read in- ydur.issue of last night the petition of the’ .clergymen of Dunedin (Catholic clergy excepted) to the licensing Bench. In their petition thipy . made .a sweeping charge against the bottle licenses, and recommended that they should be abolished. Have these rev. gentlemen considered what woold issue if such took place? At the present time families can be supplied with wines and spirits in such quantities as they require along with their, household wants and delivered to their hemes. If such licenses were can soiled then the only course for those to pursue who would be unable tq,purchase, a dozen, would, be to go to an hotel, where in' general tlfe liquor is fully twenty-five per cent higher, and where great temptation is thrown in the way of any- ■ one going into an hotel bar to purehase a bottle of liqnor. The present bottle license is a great public benefit, but like everything that is good can be made a great eurseu placed in improper hands to carry out! There is no doubt but that it is abused by those persons living in the back streets of the City,, whose only trade is liquor. Those licenses should be opposed by the police, who must be well aware when licenses are abused.

I trust that those clergymen who have signed the petition, and who have sash a horror of bottle license holders, will cease in future to apply for subscriptions to their various churches, as the money has been made in such an unholy manner. And I should advise the holders of such licenses to remember the petitfen when they are waited on. for church subscriptions, which is very often indeed. & '

Another class of persons are against the same license—namely the publicans—as they assert it interferes with their trade. Now I should like to ask, What is the trade of a Eublican? My answer is, a publican is the older of an hotel license for the general accommodation of the public who live in his house, and not for the purpose of supplying liqnor to the outside public. It is outside of an hotel business altogether to have a public bar stuck in view of the public street. —T—l.am, &c., •

A Bottle License Holder. Dunedin, June 7.