PROHIBITION AND SLY GROG.

Gisborne Times, Volume XIX, Issue 1544, 28 August 1905, Page 2

PROHIBITION AND SLY GROG.

'(To the Editor of the Times.) Sir,—The leading article in your issue of August 16th on “ Prohibition and Sly Grog” should commend itself to all thoughtful readers. Those who voted nolicense at last election, and whose present intention is to vote for it again in November next, would do well to note the statements in that truthful account of the present position of things in Ashburton. I would ask them to especially note these points 1. Those who want liquor in nolicense Ashburton oan get as much as they please. The place is full of it. 2. There is liquor imported to homes where former ly it was never kept. 3. The experiences ol the writer in the sly-grog shops, at one ol whioh he got whisky which tasted like liquid dynamite. The first shows especially that nolioense does not prohibit and does not check the drinking of intoxioants, the second that private drinking is being encouraged, and the third that by no-license law-breakers are being manufactured, and also that fearful and wonderful concoctions are being sold as whisky. The wholo article tends to show that no-lioense is no good, that it does not get at the drink evil at all, that it simply closes up the hotels at which the good liquor must be kept, and encourages the existence of sly-grog shanties from whioh liquid poisons are dispensed, Many people voted for prohibition last year because they were . dissatisfied with the licencing laws. Since last election the laws regulating the liquor traffic have been made very stringent. There is a stcong prohibition party in the House of Representatives, and that party left no Btone unturned to gain its ends when the Premier's Licensing Bil' was before Parliament. Everybody knows

too how justly severe magistrates are od infringements of the Act. Those moderate drinkers, who at last election voted prohibition through dissatisfaction with the licensing laws, must surely bo satisfied with them now, and must vote for continuance rather than for no-lioense, as a carrying of no-lioeDse would inevitably bring into our district the evils so well depicted in the article mentioned as exist- ' ing in Ashburton to-day. All true prohibitionists, too, whose earnest desire is to stop the drioking of intoxicants, must sorely rather vote for a continuance of the present well regulated trade than for a system that if carried will uot diminish, but increase the consumption of liquor. They mqst remember that the Premier’s famous clbusb 9, “ No license, no liquor,” was not carried by the House.—l am sir,