20 PROHIBITION. 



The friends of the law now find it necessary to make more strict 

 provision for its execution. They move that prosecutions be taken 

 awav from their local jurisdiction, that nobody but Prohibitionists 

 sit on the jury, that it be only necessary to have a suspicion in order 

 to convict, in case there is no one to suspect, that the beardless 

 youth of the Y. M. C. A. be taught to decoy some unsuspecting one 

 to commit a crime, that every house be subject to search without a 

 warrant, and that all resolve themselves into a smelling committee 

 to root out the deadly evil. A beautiful state of society has now 

 been reached, old neighborhood feuds are revived, every man now 

 is a spy or a hypocrite. The air is full of deception and fraud. The 

 liquor interest is active and ingenious. The flames that were fanned 

 now burn all the fiercer. Men who never drank in open day, now 

 lind stolen ])leasures sweet. Men who drank before, now drink all 

 the more. They buy liquor by wholesale now, and every man's 

 cellar becomes a saloon. 



It is under such a system of gymnastics, that prohibitionists 

 claim that intemperance is on the decrease. They offer statistics 

 to prove this. But how can they get at the statistics, after they 

 have been driven in ? If it should be found that there was less drunk- 

 enness, would it necessarily be proof that it was owing to prohibi- 

 tion, instead of education, or general prosperity, or climate, or na- 

 tionality ? Pro hoc, propter hoc, is not always an infallible guide. 

 Wliile the evil of intemperance is doubtless large enough, it is no 

 less true that the prohibitionists are not noted for temperance of 

 statement in their general statistics. Travelers tell us there is less 

 drunkenness in the wine and beer drinking countries than in our own. 

 Massacliusetts long ago tried prohibition, and has outgrown it. 

 Maine is trying it, and the police statistics of Portland show no 

 abatement of dnmkenness, while but one man in fifty, during the 

 last presidential election, tliought enough of prohibition to make it 

 national. In Iowa, prohibition has been in operation one year up 

 to the Fourth of July ; and the testimony of the mayors of twenty 

 nine leading cities and towns, is that there are open saloons in nine- 

 teen. The total number of places where liquor is sold, is 916. 

 An iiirrcasf of 14G during the year. Kansas, a young, agricultural 

 state, with no great cities, and Ijut little foreign population, showed, 

 according to Gov. Gliok's message, the following result. 



Peumits Issued to Sell liquor. 



I.ast year of Local Option 1132. 



First year of I'roliibition 17W. 



First forty five days oi second year 1 14«. 



Conccalt'd nit-thods not stated. 



