Is There More Bootlegging Now Than During Prohibition?

White Ribbon, Volume 18, Issue 2, 1 March 1946, Page 8

Is There More Bootlegging Now Than During Prohibition?

The “United States News/' published in Washington, D.C., recently had this to say on the bootlegging issue: “With repeal it was hoped the bootlegger would go, but Uncle Sam’s battle to put him out of business continues on an enlarged scale, with increased forces in the fray.” According to the same item, 2,000 more men are employed to fight bootleggers than were on the job during prohibition. Henry Morganthau, Jr., Secretary of the Treasury, said: “Repeal hasn’t put a dent in the operation of large-scale moonshiners and bootleggers.”—“Our Message,” Mass. The wet propaganda under prohibition was that jails and prisons were crowded and the states were having to build more jails to take care of the^in-

crease in crime due to prohibition. The truth is that Judge Gammill, who collected the prison statistics frorr. a number of leading states, did not find a single state or a single prison \vl*e'e there was r. t a marked decrease in prison population in 1919-1920. In nineteen large cities, each over 300,000 population, the reported deaths from alcoholism fell front a total of 1.954 in 1916 to 321 in 192 ft, a of 83 per cent. Both from “W.R. Ensign,” California.