THE EFFECTS OF PROHIBITION IN ONTARIO.
[To THE EDITOR or THE " SPECTATOR."]
Sta,—You may be interested in the results of Prohibition in Ontario and its present effects. As one who constitutionally objects to have his morals legislated for him, I nevertheless signed the petition for Prohibition presented to the Provincial Government on the assumption that it could do no harm to try it out "during the war and for a year afterwards." Having seen the result, I shall never be one to vote for its undoing at any time. The Provincial Government put its edict into effect last September, and I do net remember seeing a drunken person since that date. The hotel bars are empty—the non-alcoholic beer does not seem to appeal to any one. To be sure, one reads in the papers that a few cases are brought before the Police Magistrate every day, but they are becoming fewer. The jail is closed, assaults and other crimes are noticeably less, and the troops on leave have no occasion for temptation in the form of their old enemy, the bar. Private clubs are " dry," and most private houses are becoming so as it becomes more difficult to obtain supplies. The law allows a private person to import what he pleases to drink in his own house, and immediately following the institution of Prohibition many "mail-order " concerns opened up in the Province of Quebec and the Ontario newspapers were filled with their advertisements. With the New Year all the newspapers joined in refusing liquor advertisements, and a strong movement is now on foot to prohibit the carrying in the mails of circulars offering to ship liquor into any province in which Pro- hibition is in force. The liquor interests and the hotels made as strong a plea as possible for some form of compensation, but the Government refused to consider making any allowance. The result of Prohibition as expressed in the savings banks is remark- able. To be sure, wages from munition-making and payments of one kind and another to soldiers' families put in the hands of the poorer people an unusual amount of money, but much of this is now saved which used to be spent-in drink.—I am, Sir, &c.,
Toronto, February 14th. A CONVERT TO " DOWN GLASSES."
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