THE LATE MR JUSTICE RICHMOND’S VIEWS OF THE DRINK TRAFFIC.

Te Aroha News, Volume XII, Issue 1765, 28 August 1895, Page 2

THE LATE MR JUSTICE RICHMOND’S VIEWS OF THE DRINK TRAFFIC.

The following address, culled from the ; Express,’ will be read with additional interest, owing to the fact that it was delivered bat three weeks prior to Mr Justice Richmond’s death: — * Having instructed the Grand Jury on the legal points of. the manslaughter case in which George Harris, settler of Queen Charlotte Sounds, was charged with having caused the death of Thomas Gallery, settler of Kenepuru, his Honour-Mr Justice Richmond spoke at some length an the social aspects of the unfortunate incident. We had here, his Honour said, the case of a man who, perhaps, everybody in Picton knew and respected, going out for a ‘ spree,’ ■ and * knocking about for two and a-hJf days, drinking in Picton, and (he did hot wish to throw all the blame on the Picton people) in Tua Marina, and other parts of the Valley. He appeared to have been in. the habit of coming across from. Kenepuru and indulging in periodical-bursts. Although everyone knew that it was wrong to supply drink to a man already intoxicated, this was the sort of thing tolerated. Yet we were told that the liquor traffic was controlled, and with our eyes open.we, sub- -, mitted to this condition of ..affairs, week after week, and month after month. Of . courses. the country was threatened with extreme Ineasures which might be carried out in our time, and the practice [of 'which might be finally regretted as unjust and impolite to a high degree! He--was f taking neither one side’nor the - other s he was speaking of a situation We all knew. Now, where was the 1 lane to rest ? Such things as were brought into prominence by Gullery’s misfortune occurred, , perhaps,. more often in country places! Stationhands, shearers, and other- workers, came regularly into town -to* knock down ’ their cheque. Everybody, perhaps, was' inter? ested.in this knocking down- of cheques—, even the most respected people - in the place. And, what check does the law pro- * vide? A single constable! He is, as a rule, a decent, respectable fellow,.willing to do his duty quietly, without creating any odium, and perfectly trustworthy in a serious affair. But you could not rely upon him in a case like this.. He did not have the moral force behind him. His Honour . said he would be sorry to throw the blame ; upon a single constable in such circumstances; the blame rested elsewhere. It might be true that a better state of things could not be produced without expensive undertakings, such as the maintenance of f a body of constabulary charged with a special duty. He looked to the authorities behind the police j unless they were.heartily earnest, the remedy would never be forthcoming. The constabulary could not beexpected to do everything. It was a k.nd of tradition with the police force, that no-, body should be interfered with as long asiV he could walk, and did not make a noise. Yet, if the constable did watch him, he only followed him to the next bar j and so on, from bar to bar, until tbe poor, unfortunate individual ended up in some publichouse or other in a senseless'condition. So | he traded his hard-earned cheqne from one 1 srinp|§i£ place to another, until the last s :stag§£^nconsciousness t was reached; and he waS’,-perchance, picked up from under some, table, to arrive at the knowledge that someone had been fingering his left-hand - breeches pocket. He had known of amounts of <£4oo and 41500 haying been taken about , and lost in t|iis manner by men seeking to break the monotony of their cpuntry occupation. The hotel-keepers'! who were chiefly responsible in relieving the men of.T their-bundle of notes, were in nine out of ten supported by. or dependent on - somebody else?—their furniture was mort- ■' gaged, for instance—and how could one expect them to willingly resist the enor-' mous temptation, or expect them to ask a man to give up this business of knocking- , down cheques ? How could the rent be " paid ? We had to look beyond the publican—to the 'brewer, the landlord, the mortgagee, who were behind the scenes, takin their 41400 and =£soo and more every year for allowing the publican the privi-' " loge of intoxicating his fellow creatures. [ He was not commenting upon the insobriety- . of any particular district, nor was he giving a Temperance address, but simply referring to the existence of a social [grievance, and'the necessity of haying the evil- 1 remedied. The plea of those whom he had mentioned as being behind the scenes —thatnot being directly connected with the selling of liquor, they were not responsible* for the evils of the traffic—reminded him of the story of the Roman emperor, who, on hearing something very nasty said ' about bis actions, picked UP a denarius, and remarked significantly, ‘This doesn’t smell.’ Neither did the rent smell; yet it was nothing but the profits of-a traffic which was iniquitous. It was absurd to say that the thing was remediless. We had never . seriously tried the most obvious remedies. In this case, a man had actually met his death, after having been rendered senseless and stupid; and, no doubt, but for the traffic he would have been still liviug, and there would not have developed upen tho body of men before him the painful duty of saying whether another fellow man ifras responsible for his death or not.’ His Honour concluded his able speech by saying that he would not have to address the jury very ofteu again, and he could not refrain from saying a few words on such an exceptional occasion. .