Editorial May 14, 1932 Issue

Prohibition

Clifford P. Smith

An important fact often omitted from discussions of prohibition is that most of the United States had adopted it locally before the American people adopted it as a national policy. Prohibition had advanced step by step from its adoption by Maine in 1851 to its adoption by Kentucky in 1919. Consequently, when the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States became effective in 1920, the sale of intoxicating liquor for beverage purposes was already prohibited in the District of Columbia, in thirtythree states, and in many parts of other states. In short, approximately seventy-two millions of the American people, and at least sixty-eight per cent of the entire population, were living then in "dry" territory. Consequently, prohibition was not in 1920 an untried experiment; it already had in this country an extensive history.

Another important fact deserving to be considered in all discussions of the present subject is that the United States Supreme Court has consistently and repeatedly upheld prohibitory legislation as resting on a sound basis in public policy. For in in one decision, given in 1917, this court said, "It must now be regarded as settled that, on account of their well-known noxious qualities and the extraordinary evils shown by experience commonly to be consequent upon their use, a state has power absolutely to prohibit manufacture, gift, purchase, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors, within its borders" (Crane V. Campbell, 245 U. S. Reports 304).

Since opponents of prohibition are more apt to argue for individual liberty than for the general welfare, it is to be remembered that the highest American court has furnished the answer to this argument. Thus, in one decision this court said, "The ultimate legislative object of prohibition is to prevent the drinking of intoxicating liquor by any one because of the demoralizing effect of drunkenness upon society. The state has the power to subject those members of society who might indulge in the use of such liquor without injury to themselves to a deprivation of access to liquor in order to remove temptation from those whom its use would demoralize and to avoid the abuses which follow in its train" (Samuels v. McCurdy, 267 U. S. Reports 188). The opinion containing the foregoing quotation was delivered by Mr. Chief Justice Taft, one of the most intelligent and liberal of public servants.

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