着
​UNIV. OF MIGA,
7 2 1010
PROHIBITION
THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
BY
REV. W. A. WASSON
REPRINTED FROM
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
AUGUST, 1909
7



THE
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LIBRARIES


PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
(This article on prohibition appeared in the August number of PEARSON'S MAGAZINE, in
which public questions are discussed by writers best qualified for the subject. Many readers
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MANDIE'S MARRIAGE
a public hearing on all applications for li-
cense, and an opportunity be given to remon-
strants, should there be any, to present their
objections. After this hearing, the Board.
should have full discretionary power by a
majority vote to grant or refuse any applica-
tion. And there should be no appeal from
their decision. This power to grant licenses
is the most important of all. It is the key to
the whole situation. And this key should be
placed in the hands of the people most nearly
affected. If we can prevent unfit persons
from getting into the liquor business, we have,
at the very outset, solved nine tenths of the
problem of regulation. The trouble now is
that almost anybody that has the price,
whether he is morally fit or not, can get a li-
cense and start up a saloon.
The law may
require that the licensee be a person of good
moral character, but that requirement
amounts to simply nothing at all unless some
person or persons be empowered to determine
in each case the question of moral fitness.
And who is better qualified to exercise this
power than twelve men elected by and respon-
sible to the people of the community? The
Board should also possess the sole power to
revoke licenses. On the complaint of any
citizen that a certain liquor dealer was violat-
ing the law or that he was maintaining a nui-
sance of any kind, it would be the duty of the
Board to hold a public trial of the matter,
summon and swear witnesses, and give the
accused person an opportunity to defend him-
self. After hearing all the evidence, the
Board should have power by a two-thirds
vote to dismiss the case or suspend or revoke
the license. And there should be no appeal
from their decision.
Of course it will be objected that this plan
places too much power in the hands of the
Excise Board. Well, if you give men in this
position so little power that they could not
possibly do any harm, you make it impossible
for them to do any good. There is not the
remotest likelihood that such a Board, elected
by the people, could be unduly influenced to
grant a license to a man of known unfitness or
to drive a decent, law-abiding liquor dealer
out of business. There would certainly be
far less likelihood of abuse of power under
such a system than there is now under the
local-option system. For, under the latter
system, a bare majority of the voters can, at
one stroke, revoke every license in the town
without trial or hearing or reason. The
most reputable liquor dealer is no safer than
the dive keeper. The proposed plan is home
rule of the right kind. It gives the people all
the power they need to regulate, but no power
to destroy and confiscate. Under this sys-
tem, the liquor business would be placed on a
permanent footing. Every dealer would be
absolutely sure that his license was secure as
long as he obeyed the law and conducted his
business decently. The only persons that would
be put out of business would be the disreputa-
ble liquor dealer and the prohibition agitatci.
!
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
business, and the law should also provide a
simple and easy way to drive out those that
have gotten in.
The limits of this article preclude a lengthy
discussion of the question of a legislative
remedy for the evils connected with the liquor
traffic. But it will not be amiss to suggest a
plan of regulation which, in the judgment of
the writer, would be a step in the right direc-
tion.
In formulating liquor legislation, we should
be guided by two fundamental principles.
The first is practicability. The question to
be determined at the outset is, what kind of
excise law, under given conditions, with men.
as they are in their individual and social life,
and with political standards as they are, will
effect the best results. The trouble with much
of our legislation is that it has ignored limita-
tions imposed by actual conditions. Legisla-
tion is not the expression of ideals nor of moral
yearnings. The law should represent the
nearest approach to the ideal that present con-
ditions will admit of. Another equally im-
portant consideration, following on this is
that the same legislation is not adapted for
all communities. Hence, liquor legislation.
provide for a very large measure of
rule. But there is a right and wrong
nd of home rule. The so-called local-option
system that now obtains in many of the states,
is the wrong kind. It is unsound in principle
and demoralizing in its effects. It is at vari-
ance with the general policy of regulation. It
is part of the policy and program of prohibi-
tion. It is an instrument placed in the hands
of prohibitionists to enable them to gain their
end little by little. Now, all the features and
provisions of a state liquor law should be
mutually consistent and harmonious. All
parts of the law should have the same general
intent and conform with the same general
policy. But, under the present local-option
system, the state is following two opposite.
policies at the same time. This kind of local
This kind of local
option gives the local community too much
power and too little power. The people have
no power to say who shall receive licenses and
what moral and other qualifications shall be
required. They have no power to determine
the question of prohibited days and hours; no
power to determine the amount of the license
fee, nor to set a limit on the number of licenses
to be issued. There is no option on any of
these matters of practical administration that
properly come within the scope of local self-
government. The community has option on
only one question-whether the liquor traffic.
shall be legalized or prohibited. This local-
option scheme reverses the true order of politi-
cal administration. It withholds from the
local community those minor but important
powers that the people in the local community
are in the best position to exercise wisely,
while it confers upon the local community.
that supreme power of life or death over the
liquor traffic which ought to be reserved in the
hands of the state. Under this system the
liquor dealers and the public are in a constant
state of uncertainty as to the fundamental
question of regulation or abolition. At every
local-option election, there is the possibility of
a complete revolution of policy. To-day the
liquor business is just as legitimate as any
other business; to-morrow, it may be under
the ban of the law. The question is never
settled. Neither side ever wins a permanent
victory. The state alone should settle this
all-important question of the legality of the
liquor traffic. A question like this, involving
the fundamental rights of property and of
personal liberty, should not be left to the de-
cision of a majority vote at a local election.
On the other hand, the state, after establish-
ing the legality of the liquor business every-
where within its borders, should grant to the
local community the fullest freedom and
power in the matter of regulation.
Starting with this general principle of state
rule in matters of general policy and home
rule in matters of local administration, the
following is a rough outline of the plan of reg-
ulation that the writer has in mind as a sub-
stitute for the present local-option system.
That the people in each local community
(the township is probably the best unit) be
empowered to elect their own Board of Excise
Commissioners, twelve in number, to serve for
a term of say two years. This Board should
have power to determine the amount of the
license fee (within maximum and minimum
limits fixed by the state); to determine how
many licenses should be issued (within maxi-
mum and minimum limits fixed by the state);
to determine the question of prohibited days
and hours, and all other questions of a purely
local nature. The Board should have sole
power to grant and revoke licenses, subject to
certain rules of procedure. The applicant.
should be required to present to the Board a
certificate of good moral character, signed by
twelve reputable persons, who should be
property owners and residents of the commu-
nity. The Board should be required to hold

PROHIBITION, THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
"protecting" themselves in the "club" room
at the far end of some alley.
4. Prohibition creates widespread and
habitual law-breaking. Consider the num-
ber of crimes that are committed every hour
of the day in a "dry" state. And consider
the bad moral effect of this habit of law-
breaking on the civic life. It creates the spirit
of lawlessness. It tends to weaken and break
down that respect for the principle of law and
order which is so essential to good citizenship.
The following story shows how even good
men are unconsciously affected by this bane-
ful influence: Some years ago a clergyman
went to a certain summer resort in New
Hampshire to spend his vacation. On ar-
riving in the town, he went to the leading
hotel. While waiting in the office for the
supper bell, he happened to open a door, and
found, in the next room, a well-appointed bar.
The proprietor was in this room, and the
clergyman, pointing to the bar, said, "Why,
Mr., how is this?" "How's what?"
answered the proprietor. "Why, you have a
bar here, and you are evidently open for busi-
ness." The hotel man looked puzzled and
said:
7
"Of course I have a bar. Couldn't
you get what you wanted?" "Oh, I didn't
wish anything," answered the minister, "but
I wondered how you could run an open bar in
a prohibition town." The genial host felt
relieved when he found that his guest was not
complaining about the service. "Well, well,"
he said, "I didn't understand what you
meant. Why, that's easy. I'll tell you how
we work it up here. You see, I was high
sheriff of this county last term, and, while I
dislike to blow my own horn, I want to tell
you that I did what very few men in this
county would have done. Every three months
I raided my own bar and had myself fined."
As he finished this sentence, there was a look
of genuine pride in the ex-sheriff's face. He
seemed to be blissfully unconscious that there
was anything wrong about violating the law.
This story was told to the writer by the Rev.
Dr. E. A. Wasson, of Newark, N. J., who was
himself the clergyman that had this conversa-
tion with the hotel man.
Here is another story which shows the effect
of prohibition as a breeder of rank hypocrisy.
About four years ago, shortly after a certain
town on Long Island went "dry," a hotel
keeper in this town received a letter from a
wholesale whisky concern in Kentucky, read-
ing something like this: "Will you kindly
send us the names of any persons in your
He
town who, you think, might be likely to pur-
chase wet goods. We have a very fine brand
of whisky (naming the brand) that we should
like to introduce in your town. We shall be
glad to extend to you the usual courtesy of
ten per cent. commission on all sales that we
may make through the list you send us." Well,
the hotel man thought he would have a little
fun, and so he made a list of about thirty-five
of the most rabid prohibitionists in the place,
and sent the list to the whisky firm.
thought it would be a fine joke on the prohibi-
tionists to have them deluged with whisky
circulars. And it turned out to be a better
joke than he thought. For, at the end of
three months, he received a letter from the
whisky people thanking him for what he
had done, and inclosing a check for twenty-
seven dollars commission. This story throws
light on the curious circumstance already re-
ferred to, that, as the prohibition movement
spreads, the consumption of liquor increases.
Ex-President Eliot of Harvard sums up the
whole case against prohibition in its effects on
the social and political life. He says: "The
efforts to enforce it (prohibition) during forty
years past have had some unlooked-for effects
on public respect for courts, judicia
dure, oaths and law, legislatures and
servants. The public have seen law defies
whole generation of habitual law-breakers,
schooled in evasion and shamelessness, courts
ineffective through fluctuations of policy, de-
lays, perjuries, negligences and other miscar-
riages of justice, officers of the law double-
faced and mercenary, legislators timid and
insincere.” Such is the character and the
record of prohibition.
The writer of the present article does not
wish to minimize the evils and abuses that have
been allowed to grow up and intrench them-
selves in the liquor traffic. There is no doubt.
that some liquor dealers have condoned and
encouraged conditions repugnant to moral
sense and destructive of decency and good
order. They have encouraged other vices,
such as gambling and the social evil. They
have catered and pandered to the worst pas-
sions and impulses in human nature. And
they have done all this in a cold-blooded de-
sire to increase the volume of their business.
But the number of such dealers is compara-
tively small. At the same time, one such man
in the business is one too many. Liquor
laws should be so framed, that it would
be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for
men of this stamp to get into the liquor

PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
vision is based on the common experience
that the liquor business is of such a nature
that it is far more likely to do harm when it is
carried on under cover than when it is open
and aboveboard. Now prohibition forces
the liquor traffic to secrete itself, not merely
behind a screen, but behind a barricaded
door. The door is quickly opened for those
that know the password, but shut against the
officers of the law. The only practical ques-
tion that confronts us is whether we shall
permit the liquor traffic to be carried on
openly under the supervision and control of
the law, or whether we shall drive it into
places where the arm of the law cannot reach
it. License means the open barroom, pro-
hibition means the "speak easy." Which of
the two kinds is the more likely to harbor
evils and encourage intemperance?
2. If there is any one business more than
another that, in the interest of the public,
ought to be in the hands of men with con-
science and moral principle, it is the liquor
business. A proper kind of license law can do
considerable toward improving the personnel
of the trade. Prohibition, on the other hand,
discourages decent, honorable men from en-
gaging in the business, and thus throws it
into the hands of the most unscrupulous
and irresponsible men in the community.
The only qualification required to do busi-
ness under prohibition is the ability to beat
the law without getting caught. A couple of
years ago, in a certain town on Long Island,
one of the best hotels had to close its doors
shortly after the "dry" law went into effect.
The proprietor of this hotel was one of the
most honored men in the community. Pro-
hibition did succeed in closing this man's bar
and driving him out of the hotel business as
well, and it closed other decent places. But
what was the result? Why, within two years
between fifty and sixty "kitchen saloons"
were established in this same town. It is a
well-known fact that most of the men that run
these "speak easies" in a "dry" town are
thoroughly satisfied with prohibition. A
license law would put them out of business.
Again, the only question is: shall we encour-
age and protect the decent liquor dealer, or
shall we encourage the other kind? One
kind or the other we are absolutely sure to
have.
3. Prohibition has a bad effect also on the
drinker. It tends to discourage the use of the
lighter alcoholic beverages and to encourage the
excessive use of the stronger liquors. This
""
tendency is especially pronounced wherever the
attempt is made to enforce the law rigorously.
Deterioration in the quality of liquor is an-
other one of the "blessings" introduced by
prohibition. The men who run the "speak
easies" often make their own "whisky," and
you can imagine the nature of the “blend.” A
few years ago, when the town in which the
writer lives was "dry," a confirmed inebriate
who lived in adjoining "wet" town got in the
habit of visiting this "dry" town about once a
fortnight. He was always sober when he arrived
and drunk when he left. He was once asked
why he came from a "wet" town to a "dry"
town to get liquor, and his answer was: "Be-
cause I can get a quicker and cheaper jag on
in Riverhead than I can in
This is the
way prohibition reforms the drunkard! It is
often claimed that while prohibition does not
altogether prohibit, it does succeed in reduc-
ing the consumption of liquor. This claim is
not based on fact. But even if it be true that
less liquor is drunk in a given community
under prohibition than under the license sys-
tem, the all-important question, from the
point of view of temperance reform is, what
class of people are thus affected? Who are
the men that either cannot get anything to
drink or cannot get as much as they would
under license? Now, everybody who is not
living in a land of dreams, knows perfectly
well that the very men in every community
who most need reforming are the ones that
are least inconvenienced by the prohibitory
law. They are the first ones to learn the loca-
tion of every "speak easy" in the place. But, if
prohibition cannot reform this class, may it not
at least keep temptation out of the way of the
young? Now, the truth is that all this talk
about "protecting our boys" is sheer twaddle.
The protection is a myth. Prohibition really
creates the most dangerous kind of tempta-
tion-that which is hidden, but known.
Every young man that is at all liable to be led
astray under the license system, is far more
liable to go astray under a system that encour-
ages secret drinking. Who wouldn't rather
have his son go into an open saloon and get a
glass of beer than to have him join his com-
panions in some back-room resort? If there is
any class of young men in the community that
need the protection of the law, they are cer-
tainly not the ones that frequent the W. C. T.
U. prayer meeting when the town is "dry.”
While the good women are praying and
thanking the Lord for the great blessing of
prohibition, these young fellows are probably
PROHIBITION, THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
himself and will not allow anybody else to
take the case. The present hysterical cru-
sade is itself an obstacle to reform even in
places where the license law obtains. It is a
drain on the moral energy of the community.
It creates contention, confusion and bitter
strife. It attracts and leads astray many well-
intentioned but unthinking people, whose
interest in moral reform and whose zeal and
enthusiasm would, if wisely directed, be of
great value to the community. These people
become infatuated with a blind faith in the
power of prohibition to regenerate society,
and they will listen to nothing else. If you
suggest to them some proposition of reason-
able reform, they fly off into a rage and de-
nounce you as a traitor to the country and an
enemy of religion.
Prohibitionists not only refuse to support,
but actively and bitterly fight against, every
plan of excise reform that does not go to their
extreme. It must be abolition or nothing;
their motto is rule or ruin. In their blind
zeal they actually rejoice in iniquity. The
disreputable saloon is far more to their liking
than the decent saloon, for the more disrepu-
table the saloon the more ammunition for the
campaign. If all saloons were made decent
and orderly, the bottom would soon drop out
of the prohibition movement. Tell a prohi-
bitionist that such and such a saloon is cer-
tainly a respectable place, and you arouse his
fiercest anger. He would rather hear that a
murder had been committed in one of the
"hell holes.” In his estimation the respec-
table saloon is the very worst kind, as it de-
ceives and beguiles the unwary youth to his
destruction.
The real character of the prohibition move-
ment is thus seen in the way it reacts on
the prohibitionists themselves. They throw
truth and reason and experience to the winds,
and often resort to the most contemptible and
disgusting methods to gain their end. Some
time ago, a traveling salesman who lives in a
town in the Middle West, was returning home
from a trip. On arriving at his station, he
noticed that the streets were filled with peo-
ple. Making his way through the crowd, he
discovered that a no-license parade was in
progress. It was a long procession, made up
of women and children. They carried ban-
ners and flags, and sang "temperance" songs.
Every child wore a badge on which were the
words, "Vote for us; we cannot." At the
end of the procession were several files of
children dressed in rags and tatters. One
of these, a boy, carried a huge banner.
Printed on the banner, in large letters, were
these words: "My father is a drunkard."
Our friend the salesman looked at the banner
and then happened to glance at the boy.
Suddenly an expression of amazement came
over his face, and, breaking through the
crowd, he ran up to the ragged banner bearer,
and grasping him by the arm, exclaimed:
"My God, what are you doing here, my
boy?" It was this gentleman's own son that
had been dressed up in these rags by the good
'temperance" women and sent out to carry
this banner of shame and humiliation through
the streets. This exhibition is a sample of
the methods employed by prohibitionists to
gain converts to their cause.
CC
If these children really had drunken fathers,
it was unspeakably brutal and cruel to make.
such a spectacle of them before the public.
If their fathers were not drunkards, the whole
thing was a cheap, theatrical performance de-
liberately intended to create a false impression
on the public mind. And all this fraud and
vulgarity in the name of temperance and
religion!
(6
Here is another example of the intemperate
'temperance" of prohibitionists: A profes-
sor in one of our universities accepted an in-
vitation to speak at a "temperance" rally in a
church. In the course of his remarks he re-
ferred to the miracle at Cana, and expressed
himself thus: "I have given this matter pro-
found thought, and I wish to say to you that I
have reached the conclusion that when Christ
turned that water into wine, he did what was
wrong." Blind passion, wild fanaticism and
bitter intolerance are the chief characteristics
of the whole prohibition movement. It must
be apparent to every sane and reasonable
mind that the sooner this miscalled “temper-
ance" crusade is buried out of sight and for-
gotten, the sooner the way will be cleared for
genuine temperance reform.
Finally, prohibition must be condemned,
not only because it has failed to accomplish
any good, not only because it blocks the way
to real reform, but because it is itself the
source of many social and political evils.
These evils are briefly summarized as follows:
1. Prohibitory legislation has never suc-
ceeded in abolishing the liquor traffic, but it
has succeeded in degrading and demoralizing
the traffic by driving it into secret places.
The liquor laws in most of the states prohibit
the use of shades in saloon windows and
screens in front of the bar. This wise pro-
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
and are to-day defying, the will of large ma-
jorities.
Just how much of this active and deter-
mined public sentiment is required to insure
strict law enforcement, depends largely on
the character of the law. A stringent, harsh
sumptuary law, like prohibition, could not be
enforced unless it had on its side an almost
unanimous public sentiment, vigilant and
well-organized. Such a law has all the odds
against it. It has an uphill job from the
outset. Public officials are, as a rule, far
more inclined to heed and yield to the voice
of protest against the enforcement of a law of
this kind than they are to make an extraordi-
nary effort to enforce the law in obedience to
the demand of the other side. Under state-
wide prohibition, there are many.communities
where the majority sentiment is strongly op-
posed to enforcement, and even prohibition-
ists admit that, in such communities, the law
becomes a mere farce.
But even under the Local Option system,
which is supposed to insure local majority
rule, prohibition, in a great many instances,
does not actually represent a majority of the
electorate. And the reason is that at a local
option election, a considerable proportion of
the voters do not mark the excise ballot at all.
In the writer's own town, the vote on the li-
cense question, during the last fifteen years,
has always fallen from 12 to 20 per cent. short
of the total vote cast on other questions and
for candidates for offices. During the period
in question the town has been carried for no-
license a number of times, and in every in-
stance by a minority of the total vote polled.
Moreover, the public sentiment in favor of
prohibition is not only not strong enough in
quantity to enforce the law, but even what
there is of it is not of the right quality.
The great majority of those that vote for
prohibition are full of zeal and enthusiasm up
to the time of the election; but after election
their enthusiasm dies out, and they leave it to
others to attend to the matter of law enforce-
ment. They think that in merely casting
their ballots for prohibition they have done
their full duty and saved the country. The
writer has watched the prohibitionists in his
town for seven years, and he can testify that
not two per cent. of the men that vote for no-
license ever lift a finger or contribute one cent
to have the law enforced under either system.
The prohibition public sentiment is of that
cheap, shallow, emotional variety that ex-
hausts itself in all manner of hysterical per-
formances during the campaign. Over
against the inherent weakness of this pro-
hibition sentiment is the public sentiment
opposed to the enactment and to the enforce-
ment of the prohibitory law. This senti-
ment is of a very different kind from the other.
There is nothing frenzied nor hysterical about
it. But it is determined, active and persist-
ent. It knows what it wishes and, what is
more to the point, it knows how to get what it
wishes. It doesn't exhaust itself before elec-
tion nor grow indifferent after election. In-
deed, as soon as the town goes "dry," this
anti-prohibition sentiment begins to arouse
itself and warm up.
A man in a "dry" town wishes a drink, and
he knows where he can get it. That man is
far more interested in getting his drink than
his prohibition neighbor is in preventing him
from getting it. And when you multiply this
one drinker by a number representing half or
more of the male inhabitants of the commu-
nity, you have an idea of the relative strength
of the two kinds of public sentiment, and, if
you have any power of imagination, you know
why prohibition does not prohibit. There is
said to be a good deal of the mule about hu-
man nature, and a prohibitory law is beauti-
fully adapted to bring out the mule quality.
People resent the idea of being held up by a
lot of hysterical women and meddlesome men
who conceive it to be their right and duty to
regulate the personal habits of their neighbors.
Prohibition has not only failed to accom-
plish its avowed object, but it has been the
greatest obstacle to true temperance reform in
this country during the last fifty years.
Other nations are far ahead of us in the way
in which they handle the drink question, and
one reason is that they have not been so much
disturbed by "temperance waves."
Prohibi-
tion attempts to do that which is impossible
and prevents the doing of that which is possi-
ble. If the liquor problem, in its legislative
aspects, is ever going to be solved, the solution
must be found along the line of regulation,
and the sooner we set our feet on the right
path the sooner we shall reach the desired
end.
Nothing is more certain than that every
State and local community in which prohibi-
tion now obtains will ultimately have to re-
turn to the policy of regulation, and just so
long as the prohibitory law remains on the
statute books, just so long will the day of ref-
ormation be deferred. Prohibition is like
the quack doctor who cannot cure the patient
PROHIBITION, THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
drink the other. Everywhere and always,
outside of Islam, while drunkenness has been
condemned, the moderate use of alcoholic
beverages has been a common custom and
has been regarded as the inherent right of the
individual.
The use of alcoholic liquors is and has al-
ways been considered not only legitimate as a
beverage, but it is consecrated and hallowed
in the most solemn and weighty rite of the
Christian Church. Now you cannot, by a
mere law, eradicate a sentiment and destroy
an institution that has stood for ages, and that
is so deeply rooted in our whole social life.
Prohibition condemns the conscience, the
judgment and the social habits of countless
generations of the most highly civilized, pro-
gressive and moral peoples. Moreover, pro-
hibition passes condemnation on a great
branch of industry that has been recognized
throughout all ages as legitimate, an industry
in which some of the most venerable and hon-
ored religious orders of the Christian Church
have been and are to-day engaged. Prohibi-
tion necessarily fails because it makes no dis-
crimination between use and abuse. It arbi-
trarily makes a legal crime of an act which is
neither wrong in itself nor contrary to the
rights and interests of society. Because two
or three men use liquor to excess, prohibition
would compel a hundred temperate men to
follow the rule of total abstinence. One man
is lame, and therefore all his neighbors must
use crutches.
Again, prohibition has failed because it is
wholly negative and destructive. You can-
not remove an effect until you remove the
cause.
You cannot abolish the liquor traffic
until you abolish the source of the traffic. It
is not the liquor traffic that creates the de-
mand for liquor; it is the demand for liquor
that creates the traffic. And just so long as
the demand continues, just so long will the
supply of liquor be forthcoming in one way or
another. The attempt to abolish the liquor
traffic by a prohibitory law is as futile as
would be the attempt to dry up a river by
building a dam. Prohibitionists seem to
imagine that they are dealing only with the
comparatively few liquor dealers; whereas
they are dealing with the vast multitude of
men that are determined to use liquor.
They tell us that the saloon is a curse. Well,
be that as it may, the practical question is,
what blessing does prohibition furnish as a
substitute? Absolutely none, unless it be
the W. C. T. U. mothers' meeting and the
weekly prayer meeting. These institutions,
excellent as they are in their place, are hardly
adapted to satisfy the social needs of the
masses. Students of social science, men who
have spent years in observing and studying
the saloon and the saloon constituency, what-
ever views they may hold as to the character
of this institution as it now exists, agree unani-
mously on the following three propositions:
1. That the saloon fills a legitimate social
need.
2. That it is practically the only institution
that does fill this need.
3. That it is worse than useless to attempt
to abolish the saloon until some suitable insti-
tution be established as a substitute.
The lives of the great majority are dull and
monotonous. The proportion of pleasure
and leisure is meager and insufficient. This
is as true of rural as of urban life, but it is too
largely true of the masses everywhere. And
whatever will lighten and brighten and cheer
their lives without too great a sacrifice will
not be readily surrendered in the interest of a
questionable moral reform. If men cannot
get this pleasure openly, they will get it sur-
reptitiously, and even if it could be taken
from them by force, they would resort to sub-
stitutes which, in all likelihood, would be far
more injuriaus. The saloon exists because
there is a demand for it. A prohibitory law
certainly does not remove this demand. It
does not eradicate the social instinct and the
desire to drink that lie back of the demand.
In short, it does not destroy a single one of the
elements that constitute the life and power of
the saloon. It does not introduce into the
community a single element that acts as an
antidote for the saloon. The whole root of
this institution remains in the community
intact, undisturbed and vigorous. Under
these circumstances, it is inevitable that the
saloon, in one form or another, will continue
to serve its customers.
Law enforcement is, in the long run, de-
pendent on public sentiment. Moreover,
public sentiment, in order to make itself felt,
must be active, alert and persistent. A mere
vague wish that the law be enforced is not
enough. The wish must be followed up by
well-organized effort. When you find a com-
munity in which the government is ring-rid-
den and corrupt, it does not mean that the
public sentiment is in favor of such conditions.
It means that public sentiment is impotent be-
cause it is either inactive or unorganized.
Thus it occurs that small minorities can defy,
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
like "something." The statistics relating to
arrests for drunkenness and deaths from alco-
holism in Maine all tell the same tale. They
spell the word failure.
In response to the loud clamorings of
the Anti-Saloon League, the legislature of
Georgia enacted a prohibitory law a couple
of years ago. The act went into effect Janu-
ary 1, 1908. For a short time, the new law
seemed to have a good effect. Judging from
surface indications, it looked as if prohibition
might at last break its long record of failure
and actually stop the sale of liquor. But,
again, it was all a dream, and a very short
dream, too. The drinkers adjusted them-
selves to the "dry" system, and were soon
hobnobbing as openly and boldly as ever with
the old Demon. Conditions kept going from
bad to worse, and before the law had been on
the statute books a year, it was clearly evident
to everybody that had even half an eye that
prohibition in Georgia had broken down.
Here is the testimony of two of the prohi-
bition leaders themselves. Rev. Dr. Hold-
erby, of Atlanta, an ardent prohibitionist,
said last winter: "The legislature is afraid
to stand by the very law which it enacted
twelve months ago. Atlanta has become
a laughing stock and a stench in the nostrils
of the Almighty." This confession must
have been very humiliating to the good.
parson, as he had been telling his people
right along that he knew it to be a fact
that the Almighty was on the side of pro-
hibition. Assistant Superintendent Rich-
ards, of the Anti-Saloon League, utters this
wail: "Beer is sold here right and left, and
I know it. You can get whisky, too; for
what does it mean when twenty-seven car-
loads of beer and whisky are shipped here?"
Well, Brother Richards, it means, in the first
place, that there are a good many thirsty peo-
ple in Atlanta, and in the second place, that
your prohibitory law is a humbug. Other
leading prohibitionists speak in the same
strain as the two just quoted. Conditions in.
Atlanta are a sample of those that obtain all
over the state. •
Just a word about prohibition under the
Local Option system. The writer is very
familiar with the working of prohibition in a
number of the towns on the east end of Long
Island, and from his own observation during
the last seven years he can testify to the fact
that in every one of these "dry" towns, pro-
hibition has been a disgusting farce every
time it has been tried. In the writer's own
town the record of prohibition may be
summed up in the admission of the local Anti-
Saloon leader, that "anybody can get all the
liquor he wants in this town under either
license or no-license." That no-license has
failed to accomplish any good on Long Is-
land, may be inferred from the fact that at
the elections, last spring, every town on the
Island was carried for license by a decisive
majority. The Anti-Saloon League made
the fight of its life, but it was of no use. The
people knew all about the "blessings" of
prohibition, and they concluded that they had
had enough. The prohibitionists lost every
town they then held, including conservative.
old East Hampton, which gave a majority for
license for the first time in fifty years.
Many and various are the reasons why
prohibition in this country has proved a
failure. The following considerations will
reveal a few of the more general reasons.
Prohibition is an attempt to deprive men
of what they believe to be an inherent right.
The question of individual rights is the under-
lying issue in this whole controversy. Ma-
jority rule is, of course, a sound political prin-
ciple, but it is obvious that the application of
this principle must be confined within reason-
able limits. If a majority has a right to say
to a minority: You shall not drink beer, an-
other majority has the right to say to another
minority: You shall not drink tea. Now, if
the people in any state or town should take
it into their heads to enact a law prohibiting
the use of tea, what a fearful howl would go
up from the camp of the W. C. T. U., and
what an unenviable job the officers would
have in attempting to enforce such a law!
'What, deprive us of our right to serve tea at
our mothers' meetings and parlor sociables!
Why, it's an outrage!" "Oh, but, good ladies,
we, the majority, made up as you know of the
better element, have thoroughly investigated
this matter, and we have found that tea is very
injurious. In fact, it's a poison. Look at
the thousands of women that have gone down
to tea-topers' graves! Look at the army of
innocent little children that have been left
motherless," etc., etc. As a matter of fact,
many experienced physicians believe that tea
and coffee cause quite as much trouble in the
world as alcohol. The "temperance" people
will retort: "Yes; but there is a wide differ-
ence between beer and tea." Of course there
is, and that is just why so many people prefer
the beer. But there is no difference between
the right to drink the one and the right to
T
PROHIBITION, THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
of the eight states that adopted the system
fifty years ago, have since abandoned it and
gone back to the policy of license and regula-
tion. The people of these states adopted
prohibition in good faith. They honestly and
earnestly desired to wipe out intemperance.
They realized that intemperance was directly
or indirectly the cause of much crime, pov-
erty and disease; that it was a financial bur-
den on the state; and that it was a hindrance
to material prosperity and to moral progress.
They thought it was a better policy to abolish
than to license and regulate a traffic that
seemed to them to be the root and source of
this evil. Now, to claim that prohibition was
even measurably successful in these states,
that it accomplished even a little good, is to
insult the intelligence of the people of New
England. No sensible person can believe
that these seven states would have deliber-
ately repudiated a system that they had
adopted in high hopes and with high moral
purpose, if they had found that that system
was making for sobriety, prosperity and
good citizenship.
In view of the fact that it is always easier to
secure the enactment than the repeal of laws
of a reputed moral purpose, the repudia-
tion of prohibition by these states is all the
more significant. The only conclusion con-
sistent with reason and common sense is that
the people, after years of bitter experience,
found that they had built on false hopes, and
that conditions were not only no better but
far worse under prohibition than they had
been under the license system. It is also
very significant that the states that were
swept off their feet by the prohibition wave
fifty years ago, are among those states that are
being least affected by the present agitation.
And even Maine, which is the only one of
these states that has retained prohibition all
these years, is actually showing unmistakable
signs of genuine repentance. It is conceded
on all sides that a decisive verdict against
prohibition would have been rendered at the
last state election in Maine, when resubmis-
sion was a prominent issue, if it had not been
for the fact that it was a presidential year.
Prohibition is generally least popular where
it is best known.
If prohibition really prohibited, the fact
ought to be reflected in the figures of the U. S.
Revenue Department. But, according to the
government reports, the use of alcoholic
liquors actually increases with the spread of
prohibition. In 1893, the year the Anti-
Saloon League was organized, the per capita
consumption of malt and spirituous liquors in
the whole country was 16.6 and 1.46 gallons
respectively. In 1899, when only six million
people were living under prohibitory laws, the
figures were 15.8 and 1.11. In 1907, when
approximately 35 million people were living
in "dry" territory, the figures had risen to the
high-water mark, 22.0 and 1.58. The report
of 1908 shows a decrease of about 10 per cent.
in spirituous liquors as compared with 1907,
while the consumption of malt liquors was
about the same for both years. Thus we are
confronted with the remarkable fact that, in
1908, when the prohibition wave had reached.
enormous proportions and was wiping out sa-
loons at the rate of 11,000 a year, the Ameri-
can people consumed more liquor per capita
than they did in any previous year since 1893,
the year 1907 alone excepted.
Now let us turn for a moment to our old
friend, the state of Maine. That prohibition
has been a failure and a farce in that state is
a matter of common knowledge. No one
who is not a blind partisan will deny this.
Four years ago, Governor Cobb, a sincere
prohibitionist and an honest, outspoken man,
declared, in his inaugural address, that the
state ought to be ashamed of itself to have a
prohibitory law on its books and to make that
law a laughing stock of the nation. And he
insisted that, as a matter of common honesty,
the law ought to be either enforced or re-
pealed. Recorder Whelden, of Portland, re-
cently made this statement: "There are at
least 400 men and women who are brought
before this court time and again for intoxica-
tion." Think of it, four hundred habituals
in a city from which the liquor traffic is sup-
posed to have been banished sixty years ago!
During four years, up to January 1, 1907, in
Portland, liquors were seized on 75 streets
and alleys and at 445 different places; and 832
different persons were brought into court for
violation of the liquor law.
The Report of the Committee of Fifty,
based on a most thorough and extensive in-
vestigation of conditions in Maine, tells the
whole story of the miserable failure of prohi-
bition throughout the whole state. Every one
that has traveled through Maine knows that
there is not a town in the state where even a
stranger, if he take the trouble to make in-
quiry, cannot get all the liquor he wishes,
such as it is. And in many places the
stranger is waited on by some considerate
person who asks him whether he would not
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
slain and his dead carcass hurled into the bot-
tomless pit. But it turned out to be all a
dream. The dragon was not slain; he was
not even seriously wounded. If he disap-
peared at all, it was only to betake himself to
the cellar to await the passing of the storm.
In the course of a few years, the "temperance
wave" passed away, and the frenzy and hys-
teria that caused it, and was caused by it,
died out.
The crusade not only did not solve the
liquor problem, but it complicated the prob-
lem with new difficulties. The states that
adopted the prohibitory system soon found
themselves confronted with two evils instead
of one, the old disease of intemperance and
the new "remedy" of prohibition. And now,
the successors of the men that rallied round
the standard of Neal Dow are making pre-
cisely the same promises and predictions that
were made of old. They assure us that the
present movement means business. They
prophesy that this wave will not subside until
it has swept over every foot of American soil
and has done to the "rum" traffic what Jeho-
vah did to the Egyptians in the Red Sea.
Prohibitionists have simplified the liquor
problem at the expense of truth, reason and
common experience. Instead of suiting the
remedy to the disease, they have tried to make
the disease conform to their predetermined
remedy.
The liquor problem is one of the most com-
plex of all social problems. It does not stand
out alone, simple, distinct and isolated, as
prohibitionists would have us believe. It is at
once a moral, an economic, a physiological, a
psychological and, in its final analysis, a
purely personal problem. It contains many
elements and involves many perplexing diffi-
culties. When we look below the surface,
and study this problem in its deeper aspects,
we find that its roots are inextricably inter-
twined with those of other social problems.
So that genuine and thorough temperance
reform must be conducted along many differ-
ent lines.
The liquor problem is not exclusively nor
chiefly a legislative problem, and hence it can-
not be solved by legislation alone. The evil
of intemperance is not caused, though it may
be aggravated, by bad legislation, and it
cannot be removed, though it may be lessened,
by good legislation. The main lines of tem-
perance reform, the most potent agencies
for the building up of moral character (and
moral character is the basis of temperance
in all things), lie wholly outside the scope
of legislation. Legislation has, of course,
its part to play-and a not unimportant
part-in any comprehensive program of
temperance reform; but when legislation
encroaches on the domain of the church
and the home, when it ventures to act as a
substitute for purely social and moral agen-
cies, it not only fails to accomplish any good,
but causes the greatest harm. Speaking gen-
erally, the work that legislation can do in the
moral sphere is of a negative character-pre-
venting and suppressing the evil-while work
of a positive character must be done through
other agencies. In undertaking temperance
reform work along any line, we must learn
to be patient, and to be modest in our ex-
pectations. We must bear in mind that
temperance reform is very largely a matter
of moral and social evolution.
Liquor legislation must necessarily follow
one of two general policies. It may aim at
the abolition of the liquor traffic, or at the
regulation of the traffic. These two policies
are extreme opposites at every point and in
every feature. The object of one is to kill,
that of the other is to cure. It is on this
broad question of general policy that the
people are divided to-day.
No legislative system has ever been more
extensively nor fairly tested than that of pro-
hibition. During the last sixty years it has
been tried on the state-wide scale in many
different sections of the country and under
the most diverse social and political condi-
tions, the periods of trial ranging from three
years in Nebraska to fifty-three years in Ver-
mont. By its record, by what it has done and
by what it has not done, prohibition must be
judged. On every page of that record, from
beginning to end, are written the words fail-
ure, folly, farce. Nowhere and at no time, in
all its history, has prohibition accomplished
a single one of its avowed objects. Nowhere
has it abolished the liquor traffic; nowhere
has it prevented the consumption of liquor
nor lessened the evil of intemperance.
Neither as a state-wide system nor under
Local Option has prohibition ever made the
slightest contribution toward the solution of
the liquor problem. The one solitary service.
that it has rendered to society is that of fur-
nishing a warning example of the supreme
folly of attempting to legislate virtue into
men's lives.
There could be no stronger evidence of the
failure of prohibition than the fact that seven
ļ

Pearson's Magazine
Vol. 22
August 1909
No. 2

Prohibition, the Obstacle
to Real Reform
By
the Reverend William A Wasson
Mr. Wasson is a clergyman of the Episcopal Church. He thinks it a clergyman's
duty to speak openly against any system which he believes to be a source of immorality
and crime. Some folks say that it does not “look right" to be against prohibition. Mr.
Wasson believes that no consideration of mere expediency should deter a clergyman from
doing his duty. The object of a prohibitory liquor law is to lessen liquor drinking. Its
effect seems just the opposite. Mr. Wasson has closely studied the matter for and
he explains here just wherein a prohibitory law fails in its object. He does not overlook
the evils of the saloon. He submits a plan for the regulation of the liquor traffic which
will make for temperance. This article will enable any man to decide whether or not a
prohibitory liquor law will be for the good of his own neighborhood.—EDITOR.
D
URING the decade im-
mediately preceding the
Civil War, a great “tem-
perance wave" swept
over the country. Within
a period of five years,
eight states, viz., the
six New England states,
Michigan and Nebraska, adopted prohibi-
tion. New York, Indiana and Wisconsin
also enacted prohibitory laws, which, how-
ever, never went into effect, having been de-
clared unconstitutional by the highest courts
in those states.
years

tains-four in the South, three in the West and
one in New England. Under the Local Op-
tion system, a number of other states are being
prohibitionized on the installment plan. Not
long ago it was estimated that saloons were
being closed at the rate of thirty a day-nearly
11,000 a year.
The prohibition leaders boast that, while
ten years ago there were only six million peo-
ple living in "dry" territory, there are now
thirty-eight million. If prohibition and tem-
perance be the same thing, we are certainly
making prodigious strides toward the millen-
nium. But sober-minded people have no faith.
in the professions and promises of prohibi-
tionists. Fifty years ago, the leaders of the
crusade thought they saw the dawn of the
perfect day, when there would not be a dram
shop nor a drunkard in all the land. They
were confident that the problem of intemper-
ance, which had perplexed and baffled man-
kind for thousands of years, was as good as
solved. The great dragon was about to be
Copyright, 1909, by the Pearson Publishing Company. All rights reserved
Now, again, after a lapse of fifty years, the
country is witnessing another "temperance
wave," which has already risen higher than
its predecessor. Nor is the end yet in sight.
While in some sections of the country, the
"wave" has spent its force and appears to be
receding, in other sections it is increasing in
volume and strength. There are, at present,
eight states in which statutory prohibition ob-
E
DASSEIO-ALI

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COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY
THE PEARSON PUBLISHING COMPANY
Press of J. J. Little & Ives Co.
425-435 East 24th Street, New York
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PROHIBITION
THE OBSTACLE TO REAL REFORM
BY
REV. W. A. WASSON
REPRINTED FROM
PEARSON'S MAGAZINE
AUGUST, 1909
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