AN AMERICAN PROHIBITIONIST

Taranaki Daily News, 1 February 1916, Page 6

AN AMERICAN PROHIBITIONIST

(Contributed.) This heading describes, in part, Cap|tain Backland, of the "C. S. Holmes," .V.iely discharging cargo at Moturoa, and, what is more, he is quite prepared to avow his faith and practice in any company. Your correspondent had the privilege of a long chat with the captain, and only a portion of that interesting interview can be reported here. In the outset he was very outspoken about the loss of his second mate, L. Jensen. lie said that Jensen was a good man, apart from the drink: obliging, cheerful, knew his work and would do, it. The sad thing about it is that he would not take warning—and what drinking man will? Just as they were leaving Port Townsend for New Zealand, Jensen went ashore and got drunk, and in his endeavors to rejoin his ship by means of a rowing boat he fell into the'sea, and was rescued by the police motor-launch and put on beard the O.S. Holmes. As Captain Backland says, that should have been a warning to him. In any case it is another drink caused death. On Sunday, some visitors were on board, and the Captain told 'them that the death of Jensen lay at the door of those who voted for continuance. It happened, however, though he did not know it previously, tiiat thgso io whom he was then speaking were also prohibition voters at the last poll in New Plymouth. This is not the first sailor he lias known who came to his end through drink. He mentioned several others. Captain Backland is very wroth against the drink, and all who aid and support it, he sums up New Zealand politics rather roughly with, as he says, Mr. Myers, the brewer, as a member of the Government. So far as his own experience at sea goes, he says the drink causes infinite trouble. A ship leaves port with a part of the crew, a large part sometimes, incapacitated for duty by reason of drink, and throwing heavy extra work on the sober balance. As the captain gave his own experience of this before he became a master of his own ship he spoke with much feeling about the curse of drink to sailors.

His usual 'trading route is to Alaska and Behring Sea, where liis business is largely with the Esquimo and where no drink can be got. There is a very heavy penalty under American law for supplying strong drink to the Esquimo. In that trade Captain Backland says he never takes any liquors, and the' men have none all the voyage—cold though it often is—and that they are quite happy and contented without it. When, however, th.iy come to a port where it is to be had they seem unable to resist the temptation. A very interesting part of the conversation was when the captain described his own State—Washington— and how they carried State-wide prohibition in .November, 1914. He says the women did it, and that the strongest vote was in the Eastern part of the State amongst a. farming population. There ,was, he says, however, a very large dry vote even in Seattle, the largest city in the State and a seaport too. The majority for prohibition was 18,63;!, and the law came into operation on the Ist January, I'JIG. Of course, Captain Backland can say nothing of how it works as it is some time since he left, but he says that they will enforce the law. They have a gocd man as Governor and the Christian Churches are alive to their duty, and strongly support a law enforcement that will keep down sly-grog selling. Although Washington is now a prohibition State, liquor can be got there; only it is a tedious process. The law allows the importation of liquor for strictly individual use, in quantities of two quarts of liquor other than beev, of twenty-four pints of beer, as often as once in twenty days, under a very strict regulation which requires the importer to secure a permit, good for piie shipment only, and for only thirty days, and shipments of liquor cannot be accepted at the State line by transportation companies except with this permit attached, cancelled, and not in larger quantities than above stated. It is too troublesome a process for many to attempt it. Captain Backland says that the liquor people will try to reverse this law', no doubt, but the dry vote will not allow it. He knows of those who voted wet at 'the last poll who will vote dry if another poll is asked for and taken.

In discussing the great advance of prohibition in America, and the fact that so many States have gone dry of late years, he attributes it to an aroused public conscience. The people are coming to see how- the. liquor trade lias dominated party politics, and that it is wrong for the sake of revenue to license a trade that is '.lie cause of so much misery and crime and death. Voters are refusing to vote the whole parly ticket, and are picking out the best men irrespective of party; and, as an illustration of this, he refers to his own State (Washington) where, though it is a republican State, they have, elected a democratic Governor. Captain Eackland lias his own views .11 public matters in general. He is pioud that Washington gives th» woiiicii equal political lights with the men-, yet, "lie does not like women in office. The head of the Education Department is a woman, elected by the people, for whom he says his wife voted, but he did not. It was a pleasure to notice how heartily Mrs. Backiancl supported the Captain in all the conversation we had about prohibition when she was present. The prohibition party ought to have had her on the platform.