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BEER AND-LIBERTY.

When any admittedly sane person sets out to advance the argument that to banish beer (and all other spirituous distillations), with its attendant miseries, from this or any otiier land, would be the means of depriving the community of its liberty, surely the imagination blurs commonsense. To my mind, liquor has no leg to stand on. Laws are enacted to prohibit the sale of poison. After all, is not liquor a poison? If its use in quantity deprives, say, a workc of a certain amount of his vitality, or i it becomes a craving to those whose wi) 1 power is insufficient to enable them t withstand the temptation of imbibiii more than the system can assimilat* then it is not an essential "beverage.' and the sooner it is labelled poison th ■better for the human race. It is not ii" intention to go into all the phases c the matter. There are many good peop! in our midst who are fighting" the great est fight in history against tremendor odds—against the millionaires who ihavt accumulated their wealth at the expense , of a deluded world. My "experience" has taught me that a man is in every way I a better man —physically, mentally, napj pier—when he leaves strong drink severely alone. I have seen its ravages in all distressing forms, have been thirty-live years taking it in one form or another, have spent many an hour amongst-"jo-vial fellows," have seen individuals wax fat on the infirmities of the horny-hand-ed; but I have never seen a happy home where liquor became the all-satisfying liquid. Liberty, indeed! Chains and iron burs would he preferable in hundreds of thousands of cases to the awful miseries following in the wake of liquor. We sent thousands of our best and bravest lads overseas to fight our battle against the foe who would have enslaved us; heroically they fought under every condition; some return—unfortunately, only a proportion will return —and what do we find: many who had not Mown the taste of strong drink previous to leaving the Dominion came back to us maimed and —slaves to liquor. I write from conviction. What T saw recently in Wellington on the return of a transport convinced me that the prohibition of liquor would be a blessing. * « 4 V It has been said that if prohibition "be.brought about the employees of breweries, and manufactories, stores, etc., would be thrown out of employment and that, seeing these employees had never followed any other avocation than the manufacturing of beer —meaning all liquors—they would be unable to earn their living at any other trade. Well, what abont men in other lines of business? Who comes to the aid of the man who is thrown out of employment through the failure of an employer's business? W;h.o comes to the aid of ' the man and vartan who have struggled ' on the land and failed? It would be easy 1 to enumerate numberless other avenues 'wbjr« sutfortunia h»v» toefcUea tfc*

worthy who have afterwards had to shift for themselves. It is a fact that in the manufacture of beer—taking this line only-H;he emf ployer always looks out for the strongest men to do his work. No one ever hears of a weakling being found employment in a brewery or bottle store. So that they are well fitted to find work »f a congenial nature in other lines. Those who eschew strong drink hold !he thick end of the stick all the time; ! those who drink are the losers all the j time, and, moreover, have to "take what | they can get," for there are many grades of 'beer—good, bad and indifferent does not cover the number. Rome of it is "an awful concoction." As a soldier, on his return home, remarked: VThe same old place, same old church, same old streets; but the beer has changedl"

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/TDN19180910.2.14

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Taranaki Daily News, 10 September 1918, Page 3

Word count
Tapeke kupu
645

BEER AND-LIBERTY. Taranaki Daily News, 10 September 1918, Page 3

BEER AND-LIBERTY. Taranaki Daily News, 10 September 1918, Page 3

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