THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

Waikato Argus, Volume IV, Issue 270, 5 April 1898, Page 4

THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

TO THE EDITOR. y ll{) _l n your issue of the '2lst March an extract from the Lotidou Times is given, which, reference to the liquor traffic in America, makes statements of a general character, but fails to give proof or authority for the quotations. The article is evidently written by a warm friend of the trade, and claims tint this subject is one on which authoritative information is wanting. A comparison of the prohibition state of Maine with the drink selling state of Illinois, repeals that Maine could divide from her savings batiks to each man, woman and child of her population the sum of £l6 3s, whilst Illinois under license has a savings bank reserve of only £1 4s Cd per head—our own colony—including its 00,000 prohibition voters being represented by about five pounds five shillings each. This is certainly proof of a better provision against the rainy day in the prohibition State as against that under license. I agree with the writer that liquor legislation should not be a question of party politics—recent events show that tin police would be a greater power for good if removed from tho con trol of political parties, and placed under commissioners. The statement that illicit trade is worse than the original is sometimes put before us in this form : " There is more drink sold under hibition than under license." If that be true why do the " trade" take any trouble iu this matter. Under prohibition if the law is broken you can get convictious ; under license you cannot. The writer of the article also says the worst of all the systems of control is prohibition. No doubt this is true from his standpoint, because the money which otherwise is spent in drink goes into the savings bank. A storekeeper in Clutba was asked : " How does prohibition affect you ?" Well, said he, before we had prohibition I was not a prohibitionist. lam now, for the reason that I can do safer busiuess. Why do people bolster up so big a monopoly as the drink trade. Do they not recognise that the importers of wines and spirits and the makers of fermented liquors are very much one set of persons, who, deriving power from a lucrative business, are unscrupulous in the use of it, and have become a menace to the political liberty of the men and women of New Zealand. —I am, etc., Joseph Gane.