ANARCHY IN ASHBURTON.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3358, 26 October 1911, Page 3

ANARCHY IN ASHBURTON.

! REVOLT AGAINST NO-LICENSE. ' HAT THE POLICE INSPECTORS AND THE MAGISTRATE THINK. | The disturbance at the prohibition meeting at Ashburton on Saturday I night is but another indication of the feeling against No-licenstK in this Borough. 0 Most readers will remember that it was carried ini 19021 by the local club (whose charter was not then affectecl) voting solid!' for No-license. In 1905, at the principal booth' 618 voted for and 335 for a continuance , of the drought. At the last election 1 (1908) Ashburton was Hooded; with paid ’ prohibition orators. They were almost i as numerous as the sly-groggers and “droppers” who were working with ’ equal enthusiasm against restoration of 1 licenses. The Trade took but little interest in Ashburton, having other work to do in keeping the existing licenses ' elsewhere, and in spite of the strenuous I efforts of the prohibitionists the vot- : ing at the principal booth was 618 for I restoration and 362 against, while at ) . the other Borough booth a majority against restoration had been converted into a. majority in its favor. Since then Mr V. G. Day, S.3VL, in referring to Ashburton, saidl there were probably more temptations to drunkenness in. a. prohibition district than in a. licensed area, and his experience had. led him to believe there was LIQUOR IN PRACTICALLY EVERY HOUSE in a No-license district, and that a dipsomaniac would have many opportunities for secret drinking. It was absurd for anyone to say there was not a great deal of drinking in Ashburton. In support of this lie could say that 3000 notices of delivery of liquor to Ashburton residents had passed through the hands of the Clerk of the Court during the past six months, independently of quantities that were brought in in other ways. “If the No-licenso party think I made the remarks*objected to for the purpose of general application, ‘it is perfectly at liberty to do so, and if the cap fits the No-license party can wear it. The Timaru footballers who were in Ashburton some little time back freely stated that they had. bought a. number of bottles' of whisky from sly grog-sell-ers, and, when a person witnesses such liquor being consumed, he must believe the evidence of his own eyes.” The attention of the Government was drawn to the Stipendiary Magi.strate’s statement, and the Inspectors of Police were asked to report as to the general truth of Mr Day’s remarks. Inspector Kiely (Christchurch) wrote that after prohibition was carried at Waihi “'the ruling thought in the minds of most men was WHEN, WHERE. AND HOW liquor can be obtained. It is a fact that women have hotter cause of complaint in that their husbands drink in the shanties of their mates, where large quantities of liquor are consumed with out any restrictions. It is also a fact that liquor is now kept in private houses amongst families whore liqu-rcr was never known to. be kept under license. I long ago came to the conclusion that prohibition in its present form is a failure. It closes the public bar and! opens the sly grog-shop.” Inspector Ellison (Wellington) reported : “So far as this police district is concerned, there are more temptations to LYING, PERJURY, AND DECEIT in no-license areas amongst those who desire to obtain liquor, or to provide liquor for others than one is accustomed to find elsewhere.” Inspector Mitchell (Invercargill) said that in no-license districts persons “purchase liquor in fairly large quantities, and keep it in their homes, resulting, it is said, in an increased consumption, and the placing of temptations within the reach of many females and others who had not previously been subjected to it. Others purchase two and five-gallon kegs of besr from breweries, and sometimes, in groups of three or more, make themselves objectionable by drinking to excess in the reserves and other public places.***