LICENSING POLL

Hokitika Guardian, 19 November 1928, Page 3

LICENSING POLL

NEWSP APE R COAIA IE XT

(“Otago Daily Times.”)

Exclusive altogether of the vote east for State control, the supporters of prohibition are fewer than those of continuance to the extent of more than 50,000 votes. The prohibitionists have complained in the past that their cause has suffered an injustice in that the votes cast for State purchase and control were counted as votes in favour of continuance. They have claimed that a proportion of those votes wore votes in favour of prohibition. The hollowness of this argument has been frequently pointed out. Now. however, the prohibitionists have not even the satisfaction, such as it may have been to them, of being able to fall back, as tliev did three years' ago, upon the contention that but for the combination of the votes on the two other issues against them there would have been a majority in favour of the abolition o f tbe lin’tor traffic. Considered in the light, it has been a striking reverse that the movement to introduce prohibition has suffered. An examination in detail of the voting in some of the licensing districts instructively shows that the decline in the prohibition vote has, boon general from one end of the Dominion to the other. In district after district there is much the same tale to record,—that of a shrinkage in the support accorded to the proposal for prohibition. In over seventy licensing districts a close search is needed for tbe discovery of even 011 c instance in which the prohibition vote on Wednesday last showed an increase on the figures of three years ago. When the completed returns are available they will certainly reveal a heavy actual drop in the aggregate vote for prohibition, not merely a relative loss of ground. The results in Otago are significant of a loss of ground * l ''* prohibitionists in areas in which they more than held their own in the past. Three years ago 1(>,720 votes were recorded for prohibition in Dunedin (exclusive of Dunedin South'), and those wore, a majority over those cast for continuance and State control combined. The prohibition vote in Dunedin, according to figures that cannot be subject to any alteration worth consideration, lias now shrunk to 13,0h5. Tn three years a majority of nearly 2500 for prohibition has been changed into a majority of nearly 1700 against it. Tbe voting in Dunedin South exliibts a similar result. —a decline of 000 i\n the prohibition vote. Nor in the no-license districts, which might be supposed to lie their particular strongholds, have the prohibitionistrany really better cause .for satisfaction. In Cl nth a, ATataura, Oamaru, and Invercargill the prohibition vote is in each instance lighter than it vas >" 1925, while in the case of Invercargill jtho local ipption vote showed a very pronounced swing of the pendulum in the direction of restoration. The general effect of the poll is highly significant. It should be recognised bv the prohibitionists ns a definite indication that the Dominion does not want prohibition. The steady decline of prohibition from its position of nine years ago as manifested in successive 'polls can bear no other interpretation. It is inevitable in the circumstances that the uneconomic aspect of the triennial struggle over what cannot after this lie reasonably regarded as a really “live” issue should receive some emphasis.