OUR LETTER BOX.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXV, Issue 255, 26 November 1903, Page 3

OUR LETTER BOX.

~m t (We are at all times willing to publish correspondence on matters of public interest, but it must be distinctly understood that we are not identified with the letters of our correspondents.—Ed. Daily News.)

THE DEFUNCT LICENSING BILL. (Editor News.) Sir,—Mr Robert Glegg is q\)ite mistaken in thinking that my letter of Thursday last is a cheap and nasty iway of venting my spleen on the Nonconformists. I contend that it is quite possible to control the liquor traffic by strict enforcement of the present licensing law, especially if amended in the direction indicated by the recently rejected Licensing Bill : but for efficient control, fairminded and judicial licensing benches are essential. Let the Bench refuse to license all houses that do not provide proper accommodation, and all houses that are mere drinking shops. Let there also be efficient inspection of all liqjuor sold, and heavy penalties for adulteration. These safeguards, added to strict police supervision, would provide all that tha public has any right to require (without undue interference with the liberty of the subject.

Mr Robert Glegjg is of opinion that the Prophet Isaiah, in stating that s€roqg. di'ink is a blessing and therefore not to'be forbSdden, "had his eye on (|uality, quantity, and prices properly regulated." Well, we have no copy of the licensing laws which regulated the trade in Isaiah's time, •but, strange to relate, we have a copy of the laws which regulated the sale of li'tjuor some centuries before Isaiiah lived and prophesied. Khammurfflfi, King of Northern Bat*ylonia, lived 2200 years before the Christian era, i.»., some 800 years before the 'delivery of the Mosaic Ljaw to Moses on Mount Sinai, ,and he codified the laws, many of which date back in all probability for a thousand years or more before he Hved and reigned. Consequently, ■he is a more venerable authority than Isaiah himself, and even the omnipotent, omniscient and omnivorous Kaiser thinks that God reveals himself through Khammurabi : he considers that Mein Gott and me are at one on this point. The code contains an elaborate licensing law. In the first place, all the licensees seem to have been females in those primitive times, and Mr Robert Glegg will perhaps be astonished to learn that the law was very severe in respect of selling liquor too cheap. Thus :"If a wine merchant has not received com as the price of drink, has received silver by the great stone, made the price of drink less than the price ol corn, that wine merchant one shall put her to account to throw •her into the water" (i.e. the holy river Euphrates). Equally drastic was the penalty for allowing disorder in licensed premises, e.g., " If a wine merchant has collected a riotous assembly in her house, and has not seized those rioters and driven them to the palace, that wine merchant shall be put to death." Prohibited persons, too, met with no mercy. _ There was a class of them •described as votaries, and if a ■votary entered a wine shop for drink that prohibited person was to suffer death by burning.

Surely these licensing laws of some 5000 years back might, if revived, almost meet the wishes of Messrs Isitt, Taylor and the Prohibitionist party, including Mr Robert Glegg himself, who, by the way, does not describe himself as a prohibitionist, (but as one who demands cheap alcoholic beverages, which, however, do not find favour in Khammurabi's code.—l am, etc., THOROUGH. New Plymouth, Nov. 23. (We have taken tlw liberty of excising portion of our correspondent's letter.—Ed.)

A VERY HARD CASE. (To the Editor). Sir,—No doubt the police force shook hands with rtself this morning after securing the conviction of the kind-hearted dressmaker who was guilty of the heinous offence of allowing her assistants to use her premises and appliances for the purpose of getting up an exhibit for the recent Flwral Fete. It mattered not to the sapient officer in charge that the girls were doing the work solely for their own pleasure (and that o-f the public who attended the Fete), and used their employer's rooms merely because they were more convenient than their own homes ; the law had been broken, and tße offender must be made to sit up. Men may roam our thoroughfares and scare helpless women, or defile the minds of tittle children without, apparently, any great effort being made to trace the offenders, but such a fault as this poor lady was guilty of cannot be overlooked, and a conviction must be secured, in order to demonstrate the vigilance of the police and Bwell the Court fund. The annoyance of a prosecution and the stigma of a conviction are features to which the public can only sympathise with the " offender," but it is to be hoped that she will not be allowed to be out of pocket for the fine and costs imposed and incurred. The action of the police in retaining a lawyer to prosecute, instead of the SeVgeant conducting the case, compelled the lady to engage the services of a legal gentlemen to defend her, so she must be several pounds out of pocket. If you Mr Editor, will kindly receive subscriptions towards the payment of these charges there wili be no difficulty in raising enough tomorrow morning to square off the lot. I send 5s herewith.—l am, etc ,w . , INDIGNANT," (We shall be pleased to take charge of any sums forwarded for the purpose mentioned by our corjT"porjr!ent.—Ed.)