LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
MR. JULIAN HUXLEY ON PROHIBITION [To the Editor of the • SPKCTATOR.] Julian S. Huxley, in his article, No.7 of the series on " America Revisited," deals with Prohibition. There are a number of assertions in his article which arc not true to real conditions. Some of them might be open to argument. Others show their untruth on their face. I do not charge Mr. Huxley with -having falsified, for I am sure he has been trying to tell about Prohibition just as he saw it and came in contact with it, and such errors as he made were honestly made. There is one assertion he made which is an error, and not subject to argument : " For alteration there must lie an anti-Prohibition majority in Congress, and then its decision must be ratified separately by the Legislatures of two-thirds of the separate States." Mr. -Huxley was not acquainted with the provisions of the Federal Constitution. He should have written this : " To change the eighteenth amendment, another amendment must be submitted. This must have the vote, not of a majority of Congress, but. of two-thirds of both Houses ; .it must then be sent to the States, three-fourths of whose Legislatures must ratify it. Then there must be new -enforeerrient legislation passed and the whole proposal, amendment and legislation, must be put up to the Supreme Court."
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But, suppose the eighteenth amendment were knocked out. That would not bring back liquor in at least forty-six of the forty-eight States, because these forty-six States have State laws of their own which forbid liquor. Ohio, for instance, is dry by State-Referendum- and State law, -independent of the Federal Constitution and laws. -Furthermore, one *could not carry or ship any liquor into any dry area ; and in the two States that do not have Prohibition- enforcement laws, New York and Maryland, there would be large dry areas, which were dry under local option long before Federal Prohibition went into effect. For instance, if Baltimore were to wet, no man could take or send liquor- froth Baltimore over into Penn:- Sylvania. New York City could not send liquor across the river to Newark, N.J. Still further, nil Federal areas would he dry, including the District of Columbia, Alaska, the national parks, Army encampments, Hawaii, &e. Further yet, no man could advertise liquor in the United States mails. The Willis-Campbell Beer Act, providing that beer shall not be prescribed as a medicine, would still be in effect. In fine, you would have two States which might-, or might not, elect
to go wet, and that is am, Sir, &c., February 10th.
[We regret that we have been compelled to - shorten this letter.—Eo. Speetator.]
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