LONDON LICENSING JUSTICES AND THE EVENING CLOSING HOUR.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] Sia,—I suggest to Mr. McConnell that in public controversy it is most serviceable to keep to the point actually under dis- cussion. Prohibition and an earlier closing hour for London licensed premises are not the same subject. It is futile to think you can rule out a fellow-citizen's argument on the latter point by retorting, "You're a Prohibitionist! " Let us get back to the fundamental and indisputable fact stated in my letter in your issue of the 8th inst. The advance in the closing hour for the sale of drink in London, from ten to eleven p.m., has been followed by a marked increase of public drunkenness. I cited figures which establish this. Many Londoners regard this increase in drunkenness as deplorable, and see in it a sound reason for a return to an earlier closing hour. Mr. McConnell's letter, in last week's Spectator, entirely ignores this growth of intemperance, and explicitly argues for the " latest possible hour." It is of .some. moment that Mr. McConnell writes as the Honorary Secretary of the Fellowship of Freedom and Reform. " Drunkenness must go," is one of the widely-advertised watchwords of that organization. If his attitude to the London hours' question is truly representative, then the Londoner will have good ground to believe that what the "Fellowship " really means is that " Drunkenness must go on." For the later the hour of evening sale of drink the greater the sum of drunkenness.—I am, Sir, &c., HENRY CARTER. 1 Central Buildings, Westminster.
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