77 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



unhappy change is proof plenary of the wide departure from 

 truth, among ' other things, of assertions that sales were all the 

 while going on, which have been suppressed and only now re- 

 sumed. Such assertions have come chiefly from persons residing 

 elsewhere, in the face of the testimony officially given by the Gov- 

 ernor of Iowa, judges, and other State officers. That there are 

 other offenses against society unpunished and unforbidden is 

 nothing to. the purpose as to why liquor-selling is forbidden. If 

 advocates of temperance argue, in the way of philanthropic moral 

 suasion, that " those who indulge in alcoholic liquors or tobacco 

 spend money which could otherwise be more profitably used," it 

 is just what they should do ; but in not even the smallest measure 

 does it go to prove that laws devised for other objects were in- 

 tended, after all, though their authors do not know it, to prevent 

 this spending of money. If they have this effect incidentally, 

 so much the better for the money spenders and no worse for the 

 law. Any good " social influence " of a Code of Criminal Pro- 

 cedure which provides penalties for such " Offences against Pub- 

 lic Policy" Dr. Hammond is precluded from recognizing by his 

 assertion that they are null and void. What, then — should such 

 offenses go scot free ? "What crimes, then, should be punished at 

 all ? His boast of evading the law of Rhode Island " at a promi- 

 nent hotel n by a trick — be it professional or unprofessional — with 

 impunity * is certainly very good evidence that the law did not 

 prohibit the private act of drinking, but the public act of selling. 

 Does any law anywhere interfere with liberty of buying, save in 

 the harangues of Personal Liberty Leagues ? Prohibitionists 

 everywhere disclaim such interference, but claim the right of 

 " every independent State " to suppress the common and public 

 sale of anything deemed detrimental to " the welfare of society." 

 Any argument against this has little weight, save with those who 

 subordinate this " welfare " to personal convenience, and, more- 

 over, goes too far in that it sanctions the open sale of powder and 

 dynamite by anybody who sets up his " personal liberty " in this 

 regard. The real objection of the free-sale advocates is to the 

 actual obstacle " to get any kind of liquor a person wants " in any 

 kind of "packages," and " as many more on the same terms," i. e., 

 by some unlawful evasion — which obstacle is denied in the same 

 breath to exist ! One horn or the other of the dilemma the advo- 

 cates of free sale should now choose, after so long playing pen- 

 dulum between the one and the other. 



It is not a little surprising that under the head of " social in- 

 fluence " a stronger denial than this self-contradictory one is not 

 made. It is here suggested gratuitously to the liquor interest. 



* Popular Science Monthly, May, p. 38. 



