THE 'NEW ZEALAND TABLET' AND THE PREMISSIVE BILL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 14, 2 August 1873, Page 10

THE 'NEW ZEALAND TABLET ' AND THE PREMISSIVE BILL.

TO THE EDITOB. Pitt street, Auckland, sth July. ; s>ib,— Your views on the subject of the Permissive Bill appear to bare been formed under some misapprehension. It is not true, as you snppose, that the Maine laws have proved a failure. They may be indeed, often violated — what law is not ? Yet they have proved eminently successful, inasmuch as they have emptied the gaols, and made the most rowdy parts of populous towns quiet and respectable, and reduced pauperism to zero. I could adduce the most authentic proof of these facts, from official sources — the testimony of American judges and governors, who, it maybe presumed, are the best qualified to give an opinion on the practical working or effect of laws among the people under their rule. You mistake if you suppose that legislation can do little or nothing either to encourage or repress intemperance. Experience proves the contrary, The Licensing Acts which have been long in existence here and at home are a direct and strong incentive to intemperance, in consequence of the multitude of drinking bars, which they permit to be opened. You think the people shoi'M have no control over the issue of licenses, because that would give rise to dissension and ill blood. By a like mode of reasoning, you might refuse any popular franchise at all to be used. You cannot elect an If .P. 0., ©»• M.H.R., or the member of any local public board, without the risk of contention and ill blood. You think the friends of the Permissive Bill expect too much from that measure. But do you not err on the other side by expecting too little benefit from it, -or more ; why not give it a triol ? It is, of course, only a subsidiary or auxiliary means of promoting temperance, and does not exclude religious and moral influences, but co-operates with these without which no vnor*.' improvement of any kind on a satisfactory footing can be hoped for. You think the Permissive Bill would cause wrong and injustice. But does the want of some popular check in the issue of licenses not cause immense or still greater wroug and injustice to society ? You musfc,on reflection, see that it does. I agree with you in thinking that the*ocalled reformation did much to encourage intemperance and every form of gross sensuality. This was truly the natural consequence of men and women breaking away from those salutory restraints which the faith and discipline of the Catholic Church impose on human passions. Nominal Catholics, who seldom or never practice their religion, must be as bad ac Protestants in that respect, or worse. Archbishop Manning is not a man to underestimate the power of the Catholic religion to reform the vicious. Yet he is a strenuous advocate of the Permissive Bill and Total Abstinence League among Catholics, and nobly leads in the cause ot licensing reform at hoin " It is deeply to be lamented, in my opinion, that you should be leading ra an opposite direction, or at least exercising your influence to damp the zeal of the friends of the Permissive Bill and total abstinence leagues among your readers. I hope you may reconsider your views on this vital subject, and yet go along with Archbishop Manning, We greatly want Catholic temperance leagues here. I am well aware that much may be reasonably urged against the expediency or necessity of Teetotal Leagues or the Permissive Bill, by Catholics, and more especially under our circumstances in this Colony, so few and scattered as we are. There is nothing positively sinful in the temperate use of alcoholic liquor. The Catholic Church itsolf is a great temperance league, though not a teetotal league. All its consistent and faithful members regard themselves as pledged to temperance, and will keep their pledge. Those who are not faithful Catholics, and who seldom or never approach the sacraments, will not pra. tice temperance — at least out of a right motive — though they belonged to fifty teetotal leagues. All moral impx-ovement which is*Budden or spasmodic, and not founded on fixed religious motives or principles, is almost sure as a rule to be evanescent, and will pass away with the enthusiasm which created it. We saw something of this in the case of. Father Matthew's movement— successful beyond all precedent as he was— yet the good effect of his labors was not permanent. The Church is not only the great teacher of the ignorant, but the sole reformer of the vicious, be they drunkards or any other kind of sinners. The one thing needful, therefore, among Catholics is to get them to frequent the sacraments. That being done, everything else that is good will follow, and temperance will be the rule among us without; any teetotal leagues, or Permissive Bills. Yet in sjitd of all this, teetotal leagues are, in my humble judgment, desirable -and likely to prove useful. The Permissive Bill is meant to confer a political privilege, and is a just and righteous measure of public policy. I cannot but think that it is the duty of every freeman, und of all Catholics in particular, to support that most jast and necessary measure to tho very utmost of their power, I fear many of your readers do not even know what the Permissive Bill means, though a large majority of the Irish M.E.s have voted for it in the Imperial Parliament. John Wood, Surgeon.