The Westport Times. THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1869.

Westport Times, Volume III, Issue 521, 24 June 1869, Page 2

The Westport Times. THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1869.

It must have been discovered by most people, iu pursuing the study of their own conduct or that of others, that a sudden and severe fit of moral indignation ought to be treated with some suspicion, either as regards the inducing cause or the probable duration of the phenomenon. It is usually well to aualyse its origin, and to determine, if possible, bow much of it is owing to pure indignation, and how much of it to pure morality. Some consideration may also be given to the possible existence of such subordinate influences as pounds, shillings, and pence. Within the past few days we have been under the necessity of performing this process of dissection with reference to some morally-iudiguant correspondence which we have received, aud which, in the fair discharge of our duty, we have been disposed to to publish—a correspondence relating to the Licensing System, and, iu connection with it, to the Dobler subjects of Morality and Religion! Of this correspondence we have published one short letter, and auother we only withheld, after it was in type, in consequence of an instinctive deference to the Law of Libel. Dissecting the character of the correspondence, published aud unpublished, as fairly as we can, we consider that, while it may be wholly inspired by personal and pecuniary considerations, there are still some good public grounds for it; and, believing the subject to have some claims upon public attention, we prefer to deal with it in our own way, rather than to leave it at the mercy of the random communications of correspondents with regard to whose freedom from strongly biassed opinions we may not feel quite assured. Should our humble reference to the subject tend to encourage dispassionate discussion, or even discourage anything which may have provoked what little honest discussion there has been, some ultimate good may be done. Without going so far as to hope that the Licensing System, as regulated by Provincial Acts, will be altered or improved, as it well might be, it is just possible it may suggest itself to the authorities that the Act could be carried out more faithfully than it is, and suggest itself at the same time to those who are licensed, that, while they have rights conferred upon them, they have also duties to discharge.

"We are not aware how far the Licensing Act for the Province of Nelson either resembles, or differs from, the Acts and Ordinances of other Provinces or Colonies, but, judging by a simple perusal of it, and by a partial recollection of the enactments in other places, it seems to be rather a loose piece of legislation. It is only repeating what has frequently appeared in our Grrcymouth contemporary, and what must be perfectly within the knowledge of the residents of this district, to say that it is, in some respects, as loosely carried out as it has been conceived. Of course considerable allowance must be made for the circircumstance that it is, specially, a G-oldfields Licensing Act, in which case, unfortunately, restrictions on the sale of exhilarating or poisonous liquors are extremely few, and the facilities for their sale are as ridiculously extravagant. It has also to be considered that it is now the theory of the authorities, but of the police authorities especially, that the cheapest and easiest method of diminishing the offence of sly-grog-selling is to be indiscriminate in the granting of licenses. Their argument is that' certain classes of people will, whether licensed or not, keep houses in which drinks can be had, and that it is preferable that they should be licensed, so that the police can have those facilities for admission which are by the law afforded, but which, in the case of a simple grogselling " shanty," they could not claim. These considerations account for, at least, one feature of the system with which our correspondent " Paterfamilias " found fault. While thus accounted for, there cannot, however, be the slightest doubt that, except to the revenue of the Province, except to the police, and except to pimps and prostitutes, the present system is, as our correspondent says, " most unfair in its operation." It is unfortunately not the distinguishing feature of members of a mining community to be very choice in their company, or in the

character of their amusements, and a preference is too frequently given to the society of some solitary hussy roughly housed in the " hack-slums," over the attractions of the home or entertainment which may he afforded in houses the size, situation, oi* fitting of which, or the good erder maintained in which, are, at least, some guarantee of their character. As the law stands at present, to protect what we shall call the respectable trader against the superior seductions of these sophisticated syrens, or others similar, may not bs possible. It does not appear to he possible under the Nelson Act to " withhold " a license from any-one whatever. Still we imagine that there are, and certainly have been, cases in which the police might sink the imaginary and probably seldom used advantage of free admission to certain houses, and that, under particular clauses of the Act, licenses might be cancelled or refused where hitherto, after the commission of crimes or after the occurrence of very suspicious incidents in licensed houses, their privileges have been readily renewed. Of course we write uuder correction, aud also with the knowledge that, in the Nelson Act, there is very slight discretion left to the Beueh, and not nearly the number of permissive cases in which what Magistrates usually call " a black mark" can be placed agaiust the name of a publican in anticipation of licensing day. We need not say that with the apparently honest, however humble, occupant of a regularly conducted licensed house, no one would desire to suggest interference.

But it is impossible to iguore the looseness of what is either the mean ing of the law or the method of its enforcement, compared with both the law and its enforcement in other places; and in a few of the matters referred to in the correspondence which we have received, we conceive that there is fair reason for comment and complaint. Can or will any of our correspondents, avoiding the Charybdis of Brummagem morality, and shunning the Scylla of their own personal interests in trade, suggest au improvement more consonant with the necessities or the protection of publicans or the people? Under these conditions, considerately applied, we shall bo happy to afford them space for their communications on a subject which has, until the time of our next ksue, interfered with our intended remarks on the alleged customs and abbreviated costumes of other institutions which form the subject of our correspondents' comments—the dancing saloons.