BARLEYCORN ON A BENDER

With the statement by Harry H. Porter, President of the National Safety Council, that in his opinion at least 60 per cent of all automobile accidents in 1937 were due to drunken driving, the ghost of John Barleycorn once again raises its dissipated head. In spite of the desperate attempts of national brewers to press his pants and give him an old-fashioned face-lifting, it is the same old man that haunted prohibition societies in the early nineteen hundreds. He is back again; and unless he has mended his ways--which is exceedingly doubtful, considering the nature of the man--he is in for a great deal more harsh treatment.

For it is inevitable that if the miserable failure of repeal to approximate a solution of the liquor problem is not recognized and steps immediately taken, an outburst of public indignation will surely result. Massachusetts, for example, saw in 1937 a 40 per cent increase of its evening automobile accidents, with increases in arrests for drunkenness corresponding. Figures for 1938 show that the condition is becoming worse. If prohibition failed to squelch Mr. Barleycorn, surely repeal has sent him off on one whopper of a bender.

And prohibition societies are already springing up, armed with new crusading vigor, and intent upon running him once and for all out of the land. Then, doubtless, the vicious circle would revolve once more: prohibition would be incomplete, would result in widespread contempt for law and a demand for repeal; then, when repeal was once more obtained, it would again prove wholly untenable and rouse such public indignation as to lead back to prohibition. At no time would the problem of liquor control be satisfactorily solved.

Possibly, however, this vicious circle can be broken. A newly-formed committee of the American Association for the Advancement of Science believes that it can--through extensive, impartial study, followed by a program of public education. Always before, they point out, research on this problem has been conducted by a group hopelessly prejudiced one way or the other, or else the results of its investigation have been buried deep in the files of libraries, there to rot away and never become available to the reading public. When the results of impartial research are made generally known, they contend, a workable national program can be drawn up.

Obviously this plan offers an alternative worth trying. The problem of liquor control is merely a phase of the age-old conflict between individual liberty and the general welfare; and this problem has never been solved except through compromise. Moreover, only through general education can any solution be feasible, for the most perfect theoretical plan can be wrecked on the rocks of public indifference. It is safe to predict that the efforts of the committee, even if not wholly successful, will go far toward solving what they rightfully regard as "one of the major perplexities of our civilization."