NO-LICENSE CAMPAIGN.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 December 1922, Page 5

NO-LICENSE CAMPAIGN.

RALLY LAST NIGHT. The body of Everybody’s Theatre was filled last night, when four local speakers appealed to the people of New Plymouth to abolish the liquor traffic. His Worship the Mayor presided. Mrs. J. F. Martain said the liquor traffic was trying hard to court the women of New Zealand, but they showed their love in a very extraordinary manner, by blighted lives and blasted homes. They were very much concerned about the prices of sugar, but forgot that when the housewife could not get it for household use during the war they secured their tons for the manufacture of beer. In an impassioned appeal the speaker urged the women to free the slaves of the drink traffic while there was an opportunity to do so. Mr. Botterill dealt with the economic aspect, and proceeded to show that the revenue bogie of the traffic could be exploded by a very little thought. The £10,000,000 spent in liquor was more than wasted, since it did more than £10,000,000 worth of damage to the community by loss of efficiency, while its adjustment into better channels would not only provide the revenue but make for a far sounder commercial and industrial basis. The real solicitude of the trade was not for the public purse but its own. The Rev. O. Blundell drew upon history to show that, a hundred years ago, the same arguments were used in support of slavery and were being used to-day in the interests of the trade, and he prophesied that in considerably less than a hundred years the students of history would regard with pathetic interest the system which prior to 1922 was permitted by the people and made drunkards. Specially appealing to the young men, the speaker reminded them how their vote had been secured at a great cost, and it behoved them to use it in the interests of humanRev. A. H. Collins exposed the nakedness of the liquor traffic. It had come out with a cleaned and pressed suit. The jacket, I “Liberty of the Subject,’ had been torn to I shreds by the winds of honest criticism. I The .vest, “The Revenue,” had lost its buttons, and was delapidated at the arm- ! holes. The breeches, “Unemployment,” had been proved a humbug, and now it was trying to hide itself with its only garment, an umbrella- That umbrella was “I like boose.” In answer to the cries of the sufferer, from the traffic came the only answer: “I like boose.” This would be its answer before the Eternal Judges. Quoting the emancipation of the slaves and their song of liberty, the speaker passed on to the battle-song of the Republic, the last lines of which were rendered:

“As Christ died to make men holy, Let us vote to make men free, To our God is marching on.”

Mr. Walter Ambury moved and Commandant Middlemiss seconded, the following resolution, which was carried with only one dissentient voice: “This meteing of citizens, realising the great menace of the liquor traffic to the progress of this Dominion, urges the voters next Thursday to record their votes for the abolition of the trade by striking out the two ton lines om the ballot-paper.’