PROHIBITION A FAILURE IN MAINE.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume II, Issue 18, 8 July 1899, Page 2

PROHIBITION A FAILURE IN MAINE.

Aside from the elections already referred to what, after all, has been theresult"'of the prohibitory law in theatate of Maine, which Prohibiliouiste claim to be the successful test state ?' A satisfactory answer to this question requires a 1 knowledge of the mischief caused by the drinking habits which' prevailed in that state before the prohibitory law came into force ai?d of the extent of the mischief caused ' by those habits as they prevail there at the present time. No part of the Union was moretemperate previous to the passage of the prohibitory law than the state of Maine 1 was. except among her lumbermen. The fact that she was the pioneer state in legislative Prohibition, shows that her citizens were' devoted to what they believed4o be temperance principles. Even fifty years ago ,&> great number of total abstinence so- , cieties- existed in Mame. Licenses were at that time granted! with discretion, and- selliug , without license was severely putiished. The temperance sentiment was so strong that there were many towrrships fron>i which liquor had practically baen driven. Before the prohibitory law' was enacted, not one person in one thousand throughout Maine drank to such excess as to be "habitually beyond '- self-control. i , The facilities for getting liqtibr, and ! , the actual buying and drinMng'of it, in.-. Maine, are greater at the present timo than the* were before the Act came* . into force. At one fell stroke the socalled! prohibitory law blighted' every temperance society, and planted instead a local liquor agency in' every town, willingly op' unwillingly., throughout tht state. The extent' tfo?" which some of these agencies dispense liquors was shown at a prohibitory con* vention held early in 1886 at the tow a of Saoo, in Maine, when statistics were' produced showing/that, with a population of 6,389, as many as 16.000 perscriptions of lipuor had been put up at the local liquor agency of that townduring a period of two hundred days. Besides these local liquor agencies, , which are established under the autliorifcty of the law, and of which there < are at present twenty-six throughout the state, there exists in violation 'of the law a large number of

LICENSED G-ROGGERIES. The entire number of places throughout the State of Maine licensed to sell' intoxicating liquors' during the fiscal' year which ended. on the 30th of April,. 1887,. was 1,250 ; as this statement, that there were licensed gcoggeries in a State where, theoretically, no intoxicating liquors are allowed to be sold' seems so extraordinary as to call for' an explanation, the following particulars are given : — By the Revised' Statues of the United! States, Title 1, 2 and 3, provision is made for taxing'those who are engaged^ in the sale of liquor ; authority is givenunder which- revenue . collectors areappointed for districts throughout the' states and territories. Every personwho is engaged in selling liquor "must register with the- collector of his dis^ trict his name, placa of residence, and? the place where such business carried on. Be must pay the fee of 20* dollars for the stamp allowing him- to< sell malt liquors- only, or 85 dollars for; the stamp allowing" him to sell ' spir'itpus or malt liquors.' tJp'pn payment of the tax, he is to be' given the proper ' Government stamp authorising hinrto sell. Every collector, must :keep"in a 1 proper place in.'b.is_ office for public inspection an alphabetical list^ofjthe--namea of all 1 persons jwho h^Ve^pajfls.' him. the. tax, automating; the tiii&tf!amL

Ie place of business for which it aid. Every collector must send puties throughout his district to 3l it who are liable to pay the ) ta\. find every person who sellswithout having paid the tax is to a penalty of not less than dollar and not more than 5000 s> and to be imprisoned for a dof not less than six months nor than two years. Druggists who iquois in the compounding and ifactnre of medicine only, need ,ay the tax. It is further provided "the payment of this tax shall not sld to exempt any person from airy Ity or punishment provided by the of any state for carrying on the less within such state, or authorhe commencement or continuance icli business contrary to the IaAVS ich state or any place where it is übited by municipal law." (To bo continued.)