e desires and needs, are of a wholly different
nature? Could the tyranny of the majority take a more obnoxious form
than that of sparse rural populations, scattered over the whole area
of the country from Maine to Texas and from Georgia to Oregon,
deciding for the crowded millions of New York and Chicago that they
shall or shall not be permitted to drink a glass of beer? Nor is it
only the obvious tyranny of such a regime that makes it so
unjustifiable. There are some special features in the case which
accentuate its unreasonableness and unfairness. In the American
village and small town, the use of alcoholic drinks presents almost no
good aspect. The countryman sees nothing but the vile and sordid side
of it. The village grogshop, the bar of the smalltown hotel, in
America has presented little but the gross and degrading aspect of
drinking. Prohibition has meant, to the average farmer, the abolition
of the village groggery and the small-town barroom. That it plays a
very different part in the lives of millions of city people--and for
that matter that it does so in the lives of millions of industrial
workers in smaller communities--is a notion that never enters the
farmer's mind. And to this must be added the circumstance that the
farmer can easily make his own cider and other alcoholic drinks, and
feels quite sure that Prohibition will never seriously interfere with
his doing so. Altogether, we have here a case of one element of the
population decreeing the mode of life of another element of whose
circumstances and desires they have no understanding, and who are
affected by the decree in a wholly different way from that in which
they themselves are affected by it. Many other points might be made,
further to emphasize the monstrosity of the Prohibition that has been
imposed upon our country. Of these perhaps the most important one is
the way in which the law operates so as to be effective against the
poor, and comparatively impotent against the rich. But this and other
points have been so abundantly brought before the public in connection
with the news of the day that it seemed hardly necessary to dwell upon
them. My object has been rather to direct attention to a few broad
considerations, less generally thought of. The objection that applies
to sumptuary laws in general has tenfold force in the case of National
Prohibition riveted down by the Constitution, and imposed upon the
whole nation by particular sections and by