30 THE GOTifiEKBURG SYSTEM OE LiQtTOR TRAEEtC. 



way if we cannot cure drunkards already made, we may 

 prevent the making of others." 



Neither must the Gothenburg system be confounded 

 with the recent experiment in South Caiolina, though 

 they have some features in common. TLiat in the tirst 

 place was a political measure ; instead of a company the 

 State took control of the liquor traffic, its agents were 

 political appomteeS) only a very few persons in any com- 

 munity were directly interested in and responsible for 

 the manner in which sales were conducted, and the 

 scheme was perhaps too close to practical prohibition to 

 meet the situation in any but a most advanced temper- 

 ance community. The Gothenburg system divorces 

 liquor from politics, makes the immediate community 

 the interested and responsible parties for its enforcement, 

 and advances towards absolute prohibition as fast as 

 public opinion is ready for such advance. The value of 

 placing the initiative with the community, rather than 

 with the State, and of fixing the responsibility upon the 

 community cannot be overestimated. Then, in the 

 second place, the South Carolina experiment was, in re- 

 ality (so it is said) a measure for revenue. Governor Till- 

 man had promised reduced taxation ; this was the way 

 in which to bring it about. But a liquor traffic con- 

 ducted for State profits is only one degree less harmful 

 than a liquor traffic conducted for individual profits. It 

 perpetuates the evil, tends to increase it, and makes it 

 respectable. The Gothenburg system takes away the 

 idea of profits altogether. Tiie less money made, the 

 better satisfied are those who conduct it ; and the distri- 

 bution of unavoidable gains is aought to be made in such 

 a way as to demoralize neither State nor community. 



One word more. Massachusett's failure last winter in 

 securing the Norwegian system as an alternative with 

 local option, so that each town would have the right to 

 decide (1) Shall any licenses at all be granted? and (2) if 



