A PLEA TO YOUNG ELECTORS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XLIX, Issue 12628, 16 October 1905, Page 7

A PLEA TO YOUNG ELECTORS

To the Editor

Sir, —The great question now is, "Are yod going to vote for No-License?" My idea of writing to your valuable paper is to appeal to the young men of our district to use their vote and also their influence in persuading their comrades of both eexes to also vote for No-license. Is it beneficial? is asked. " Well, young people, it is. " A guaranteed success right out with both hands." as the Yankee puts it, meaning morally and financially. Look at Ashburton. The rateable values in the borough during the years 1902-03 were £46,713. This total was while the hotels, clubs, etc., were licens>ed. Now, note t<he difference. Under No-licence for the years 1904-05, £46,713—a clear £2,329 improvement in properties, etc. Now the rateable values of hotel properties under license were £1420, under No-license. £427, a difference of £993. Yet notwithstanding this fact, and mind you £993 is a large amount to take off a balance-sheet for a small town, the borough finances show a clear profit of nearly £100 as compared with the bal-ance-sheet und€-r license. T'3i© police returns show an enormous difference in the list of different crimes as perpetrated during License and No-license years, No-lioenee carrying the smallest by more than half. There is hardly half-a-dozen in a hundred persons who when asked. "Do you think No-License a success?" will other than say "Yes." They have experienced it. They know the result. They have given their opinion in fche pamphlet issued under the heading " Ashburton Answers." I ask tho young people of our district to get cn^. of these pamphlets and read it, and if after doing so they can give me one excuse with a grain of reason in it why No-license is not beneficial I shall be more than surprised. Not on'y surprised, but I am willing to argue the- question through your columns, and if beaten will own myself b&aten. Here's a chanou for some of the supporters of License. " Let 'em all come." They class those who writo-.in No-license and support it as ".Faddists," "milk and water men," " Okehu runners," etc. Let us see what the " mountain dew " men can do with their arguments. Let them put forth two Statements as sound as I have in favour of No-License for License, * and then I shall think they have iSO'mething "up their sleeve." LiquoV as a medium has been for some time ""a great plea among those who favour License. Hear, now, what Dr Poster, one of the most eminent physicians of the day says:—" Alcohol is not ?i'food. In certain cases it itfay be a substitute for food, but it never, is, and never C;an be a food?. It .furnishes heat, lit is..tr\ie, but -dees Vnot supply it in the'way sugai' does'.. Sugar, and starch after it has been turned into sugar by the digestive \ juices,:-pass into the liver and are by^|t-^is^ribut^d ;td^ sXipply heat to the o€hei l parhs of tiie body, while alcohol is absorbed and disSibu-i^d by the epithelial cells of the digestive tract, which ds not as nature "intended,, it should bs. BesideSjV^loohol" heats -to"o quickly, and is fql&xwed by a reaction that is injurious. Is this true of beer and claret? Just as truo as of all other alcoholic beverages. Instead of aiding digestion, as some people believe, they actually retard it, except in the case of elderly people, to whom a little wine, judiciously and sparingly taken, is a district benefit. But to the young man, or the man in the prime of life, alcohol retards digestion, and it is not until he is, as it were, on the down grade that it becomes o£ any benefit." Now, sir, after these little items I hope that my letter may tend towards helping the great cause of No-license and convince more than one of the beneficial effects that the closing of the bars carries with it.—l am, etc., FACTS.