_The Permissive Liquors Bill_—_Its Advocates and their Arguments_—_The Drunkenness of the Nation_—_Temperance Facts and Anecdotes_—_Why the Advocates of Total Abstinence do not make more headway_—_Moderate Drinking_—_Hard Drinking_—_The Mistake about childish Petitioners_.
THERE has recently appeared on the temperance stage a set of well-meaning gentlemen, who, could they have their way, though they would sweep every public-house and beershop from the face of the land, are yet good-natured enough to meet objectors to their extreme views a “third” if not “half-way.” Sir Wilfred Lawson is the acknowledged head and champion of the party, and its news on the all-important subject are summed up in a Permissive Prohibitory Liquor Bill. It may be mentioned that the said Bill was rejected in the House of Commons by a very large majority, and is therefore, for the present, shelved. It stands, however, as an expression of opinion on the part of eighty-seven members of parliament, backed by 3,337 petitions, more or less numerously signed, from various parts of the kingdom, as to what should be done to check the advancing curse of drunkenness, and, as such, its merits may be here discussed.
The Permissive Prohibitory Liquors Bill, as Sir Wilfred Lawson describes it, provides that no public-houses shall be permitted in any district, provided that two-thirds of its population agree that they should be dispensed with. If there are thirty thousand inhabitants of a parish, and twenty thousand of them should be of opinion that public-houses are a nuisance that should be abolished, the remaining ten thousand may grumble, but they must submit, and either go athirst or betake themselves to an adjoining and more generous parish.
Sir W. Lawson, in moving the second reading of his Bill, said “that no statistics were needed to convince the House of Commons of the amount of drunkenness, and consequent poverty and crime, existing in this country; and even if here and there drunkenness might be diminishing, that did not affect his argument, which rested upon the fact that drunkenness in itself was a fertile and admitted source of evil. The Bill was called a ‘Permissive Bill;’ but had the rules of the House permitted, it might with truth be called a Bill for the Repression of Pauperism and of Crime. The measure was no doubt unpopular in the House, but it was a consolation to him that, although honourable members differed in opinion as to the efficacy of the remedy proposed, they all sympathised with the object its promoters had in view. The trouble to which he feared honourable members had been put during the last few days in presenting petitions and answering letters showed the depth and intensity of the interest taken in the question out of doors. No less than 3,337 petitions had been presented in favour of the Bill. It would be remembered that in the parliament before last a bill similar in its character had been defeated by an overwhelming majority, all the prominent speakers in opposition to it at that time declaring that they based their hopes as to the diminution of drunkenness upon the spread of education. He agreed in that opinion, but the education, to be successful, must be of the right sort; and while an army of schoolmasters and clergyman were engaged in teaching the people what was good, their efforts, he feared, were greatly counteracted by that other army of 150,000 publicans and beersellers encouraging the people to drinking habits. All these dealers in drink had been licensed and commissioned by the Government, and were paid by results; they had, consequently, a direct pecuniary interest in promoting the consumption of as large an amount of drink as possible. Naturally, if a man entered into a trade, he wished to do as large a trade as possible; and he had always felt that the advocates of temperance did more harm than good in using hard language against the beersellers, when it was the law which enabled them to engage in the trade, which was primarily responsible for the result.”