IS PROHIBITION A FAILURE?
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Your correspondent, Sir J. Agg Gardner, clearly desires the answer to the above question to be in the affirmative.- His' motive, presumably, is the love of liberty expressed in the claim of grown-up individuals to select their own diet and to manage their own individual affairs. I would venture to Point Out that this claim is not absolute; as in the case of Robinson Ciusoe, but conditioned by circumstances, temporary of permanent. Your correspondent will, probably, assent to' this doctrine in certain cases. For instance, a man has a natural liberty to sniff cocaine or inject morphia;. another man has an equal right to supply these articles ; yet I Suppose that Sir James would approve the severe almost savage' pena' lties which would follow the exercise of such a right. The true appeal is not to liberty in the abstruc. t but to expediency.—I am, Sir, &c., FRANK ADKIN:5. 15 Wynne Rood, London, S.W. 9. -
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