AN ABRIDGMENT OF LICENSE

At the recent mass meeting called by the Massachusetts Branch of the Association opposed to National Prohibition in the Mechanics Building, the following statements were made by Mr. C. A. Windle of Chicago, the most plausible speaker of the evening:

"Prohibition is neither right in principle nor is it Christian in character. Temperance has to do with your control of yourself. It is right. It can be defended. Prohibition has to do with your control by others. It is wrong and has no defense. Temperance is self-imposed and self-enforced; Prohibition is imposed by others against your will, and enforced with a policeman's club. You can no more promote pure temperance by force than you can make love with a brickbat. Prohibition is insulting to your manhood, because it denies to you the right of self-determination."

The implication running through the whole of Mr. Windle's argument is that civilized man will become so immediately capable of temperance, that no restraint is needed to keep him from alcoholic excess. The attainment of this condition will at best require a long process of steady development. Throughout this process, the excesses, and resultant losses to national usefulness and well-being are bound to continue.

If a man gets drunk and maltreats his family, or becomes a menace or nuisance to those with whom he comes in contact, the result, far from being liberty, is a clear infringement of the liberties of other people, as it subjects them to definite inconveniences and restraints, if not sufferings. Even the man who becomes passively drunk, quite apart from harming himself, is cheating society out of his usefulness. It is all very well to say that free government is better than good government, and that prohibition is an infringement of private liberty. But when liberty has become to a large extent license, and that license is of a type to stunt and inhibit progress by destroying the effectiveness of a definite number of human beings in each generation, it is the clear duty of the state to step in and protect society from a part of itself, if necessary by compulsion. Beyond all doubt this clear duty may be performed satisfactorily by the state only by the enforcement of a strict prohibition of intoxicating beverages.