TO BE OR NOT TO BE ?

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 24 April 1919, Page 3

TO BE OR NOT TO BE ?

|g£- What looked like an overmajority for the cold people has grown small by degrees, until at the time of writing their margin has dwindled down to nothing. Consequently there is consternation in the ranks of the Never-Touch-Its, and a corresponding elation in those of Bung. Undoubtedly there would have been more votes; 1 a great many more votes, cast for Prohibition had not the fear of another epidemic of influenza been in the public mind Rightly or wrongly most people seem to be under the impression that alcoholis the best medicine for the "flu." Doctors differ on the point, it is true,. but that fact does not appear to impress the general public. Another reason why so many people yoted for continuance, I fancy, was that just prior to the poll the Government, or a member of the Government, replying to a letter of enquiry, definitely admitted that in the event, of Prohibition being carried (and contrary, I think, to a previous announcement) no intoxicating liquor of any description would be permitted to be manufactured in the homes of the people and for ""private consumption, and that the police would be empowered at any time to search people's houses for liquor if they suspected that any was concealed.