552 



The Review of Reviews. 



Dfcember I, I9j'. 



iilea of m.iking the burglar cease to burgle, but the 

 dominant idea in the framing of the law against 

 burglary is the protection of the householder, and 

 in our great fight for social reform one of the aims 

 undoubtedly is to improve the condition of the 

 community, to make it easy for people to do right 

 and hard for them to do wrong; to prevent people 

 frorft becoming gamblers and drunkards, etc. In 

 this reform this ;ispect is a wide one. 



But there is another aspect as well. Society has 

 got to be prott-cted against the depredations of the 

 gambler, the drunkard, and the immoral. As it is, 

 the community suffers morally, physically and 

 linajicially ; and more in this recent struggle than 

 at any other time the people have come to the un- 

 <lt=rstanding that it is a fight between the forces of 

 i,"od and the forces of evil in the community, a 

 struggle that will have to be continued until the 

 over-world conquers the under-world and completes 

 its work by making, through its regeneration, the 

 under-world to be no more. Society to-day is 

 clamouring for protection against a daily encroach- 

 ing foe. To-day liquor and gambling dominate our 

 jiolitics, rule our social life, corrupt some of our 

 politicians, endeavour to corrupt our police force 

 and sometimes succeed, while the decent part of the 

 community has either sat still indifferent, or else 

 wrung its hands in hopeless despair. Meanwhile 

 the under-world laughs merrily and goes on its wav 

 rejoicing. 



XwT Acts of Parliament can make men better, 

 or help very largely thereto. They can be one of 

 the many determining factors in a man's elevation. 

 Acts of Parliament are simply the rules which the 

 State householder frames for its good, and it is as 

 ridiculous to say that they have no weight in moral 

 reformation as to say that the rules which a wel- 

 ordered household lays down have no efficacy in pro- 

 moting the welfare of its members. The household 

 with no laws is likely to go to the dogs ; one with 

 stringent guiding rules and prohibitions is likely to 

 develop magnificently. The rule of a well-ordered 

 household is a series of " thou shalts " and " thou 

 shalt nots," a code of laws, and the finer the scale 

 on which they are drawn and the better the ad- 

 ministration of them, the more likely are the sons 

 nd daughters to grow up into good citizens. So 

 with the State, which after all is but a household, 

 framing laws for its own protection and for the 

 development of its citizens. A countn,- without law 

 is likely to degenerate into the \vorst tvpe of a law- 

 less country, seeing that the golden ' day has not 

 yet come when every man will do to others what 

 he wants others to do to him. Every law, there- 

 fore, which curbs evil instincts, which' regards both 

 individual and community rights, which suppresses 

 \ice. which rewards virtue, which removes condi- 

 tioTis of wrong, which makes conditions for rearing 

 in virtue easy, is going to make men better. 



It follows therefore that the present great cam- 



paign in favour of social reform, if successful in 

 passing laws to suppress evil, is going to help to 

 make men better. The man who finds all his facili- 

 ties for wrong-doing cut off is far more likely to 

 develop into a better man than if facilities for 

 wrong-doing are multiplied. That is all we are ex- 

 pecting, that Acts of Parliament shall assist to re- 

 move objectionable conditions of society, to bring 

 in excellent ones, and to erect the safeguards which 

 are necessary for the protection of humanity. 



Xo more striking illustrations of what Acts of 

 Parliament can do with regard to social and indi- 

 vidual regeneration can be found than in some of 

 the legislation passed in Australasia during the last 

 few years. In New Zealand, in 1894, electors first 

 voted under the Local Option Act on the question 

 as to whether the liquor traffic should remain or 

 not. In the twelve years which have elapsed since 

 that time, Xo-License has by three-fifths majorities 

 been won in six localities, with the result that some- 

 where about 70,000 people in Xew Zealand are 

 living under No-License. The result is so splendid 

 that every visitor to these districts is struck with the 

 different appearance of the street as compared with 

 the licensed areas, while the general tone of the in- 

 habitants is greatly raised and offences against the 

 general law are very much rarer. In Clutha, where 

 Xo-License has reigned for years, children are grow- 

 ing up without ever having seen a drunken man. 

 Children reared in such surroundings are not likeK 

 to develop the drink habit. 



This is a capital illustr.iJon of the good that an 

 Act of Parliament can work. What has been done 

 in these cases is simply this : the Act of Parliament 

 is a channel through which the desires of the people 

 can flow. That it has helped to make conditions 

 finer and the people better is evident from the 

 number of men who now are sober who before were 

 not. 



The man who insists that you can't make men 

 better by Act of Parliament savs that there are 

 more cases of sly grog-selling under Xo-License 

 than there were under License. That is quite pos- 

 sible, but it does not affect the principle which we 

 are establishing. Personally, however. I am not 

 prepared to grant that assumption. There could 

 liardlv be more sly grog-selling under any system 

 of Xo-License than there is under our present sys- 

 tem of License. Selling during prohibitive hours 

 is really sly grog-selling, and everybody knows how 

 generally that practice is carried on. Compared 

 with the magnitude of the offence under License, 

 sly-grog cases under X^o-License shrink away into 

 insignificance. But if there is sly grog-selling, it 

 merely indicates the lawless spirit of the traffic, de- 

 termined to flourish in spite of the law, and forms 

 an additional reason why it should be put down. 



Or let us take an illustration that is nearer to 

 hand. Only a few weeks ago Xew .South Wales 

 passed a rigorous .Anti-Gambling Bill, which prac- 



