AN EXPERIMENT IN PROHIBITION. 47 



community requires, the proof being that in a market without favor 

 they get the wage, and to increase the reward of other laborers be- 

 yond what in the same free market the community would freely give 

 them. Whether the production would be continued at all if there 

 were any success in these attempts, common-sense will tell us. Those 

 who have done some hard work in the world will, I am sure, agree 

 with me that it is only done by virtue of the most powerful stimu- 

 lants. Take away the rewards, and even the best would probably not 

 give themselves up to doing what the community wants and now pays 

 them for doing, but they would give themselves up either to idleness 

 or to doing something else. The war of the land-nationalizer and 

 socialist is then not so much with the capitalist as with the workman, 

 and the importance of this fact should not be lost sight of. 



-■»»» 



AN EXPERIMENT IN PROHIBITION. 



Bt EDWAED JOHNSON. 



THE liquor question, like the poor, we have always with us ; and 

 at present, as at almost any time for many years past, the best 

 method of dealing with it is being actively discussed in many parts cf 

 the country. Public opinion seems to be divided between repressive 

 and restrictive legislation ; and, in view of this fact and of the efforts 

 of those who favor the prohibitory system to introduce it in localities 

 where other methods have hitherto prevailed, the experience of Ver- 

 mont, which has had a prohibitory liquor law for more than thirty 

 years, furnishes an instructive lesson. 



The Vermont law was passed by the Legislature of 1852. In the 

 Legislature, as among the people, there was a close division of senti- 

 ment, the law finally passing by a vote of 91 to 90, and being ratified 

 by the people of the State by a vote of 22,215 to 21,044— a popular 

 majority of only 1,171 for the law. According to its terms, the law 

 went into effect in March, 1853, and has ever remained the settled 

 policy of the State. As originally enacted, it merely forebade the 

 selling, furnishing, or giving away of intoxicating liquor, under mdo- 

 erate penalties, and provided for the appointment of an agent in each 

 town, who should be authorized to sell liquor for medicinal and me- 

 chanical purposes, the profits of the sale accruing to the town. But, 

 from the moment of its adoption until the present time, the advocates 

 of the law have been continually engaged in enlarging its scope and 

 strengthening its provisions. Each Legislat'ire since 1853 has modi- 

 fied and amended the law in the direction of increased thoroughness, 

 severity, and efiiciency. Its supporters have indeed taken " Thorough " 

 for their motto. Everything they have asked has been granted by 



