necessary for the prevention of a greater evil. Penal justice can only be a train of evils.*

We readily admit that a prohibitory liquor law would abridge somebody's liberty; that its pains and penalties would be deemed evil by the law-breaker; but are we to draw the conclusion that there shall be no law? An absurd objection against all law, can hold least of all against the proposed law, which, as facts go to prove, would destroy (by reaching the cause) seventy five per cent of our crime and the train of evils connected with its punishment evils in the constraint of the criminal-evils in the pursuit of the accused ere the innocent can be discriminated from the guilty evils in the infliction of judicial sentences-and evils in the inevitable reactions upon the innocent connections of the criminal, as well as upon society.-Not only are the general principles of law laid down by this great jurist (BENTHAM) in perfect accordance with the views of the Alliance,' but even his special details and expressions. For example, under the category of 'Indirect means of Preventing Crime,' he includes "Methods which act either physically or morally upon the man, in order to dispose him to obey the laws-to remove from him temptations to crime, and govern him by his inclinations and knowledge.

66

Inclination, Knowledge, Power; these are the three points to which the influence of the laws may be applied, in order to determine the conduct of individuals. I begin with power, because the means of influence in this respect are more limited, and more simple, and because in those cases in which the power to injure is taken away, everything is done-success is sure.

"As to internal power, which depends upon the faculties of the individual, the power of doing evil is inseparable from the power of doing good. Imprisonment is the only one means which can be justified, in certain cases, in order to prevent an apprehended offence.

There are some cases in which the power of injuring may be taken away, by excluding what Tacitus calls irritamenta

*Principles of Penal Law. Part iii. Works, i. p. 533, et seq.

+ Let us here anticipate the cant cry of 'coercion.' Law itself is not coercive' but purely declarative-the announcement of a social rule. The coercion is in the 'sanction' of the law, and he who objects to that, logically objects to every law, whether natural or positive, human or divine. A law without a penalty for disobedience, is simply a dead letter. An Anti-liquor Law, therefore, just operates like any other-it declares the Will of the Law makers, and furnishes, through its sanctions, motives for obedience. An objection against the wisdom or justice of the law itself is logically legitimate, but an objection to a special law founded upon the essential characteristic of all law-namely, that it has a coercive' sanction'is utter imbecility. The moral law, of which we hear so much by those who advocate moral suasion in opposition to positive law, is a law that announces duties and offences as much as any other-and it has influence only so far as its 'sanction,' the Divine retribution behind it, is actually believed in. To say by the judge, Imprison whoever in due form of law is convicted of stealing, is as really the announcement of a Moral Law as Thou shalt not steal-only it is likely to be more efficacious with the masses, inasmuch as they can realize the Police sanction more distinctly than the spiritual and invisible Nemesis.

malorum-[the subjects and suggesters of the offence]: as the prohibition of the sale and fabrication of dies for coining; of poisonous drugs; of concealed arms; of dice, and other instruments of prohibited games:" (to which may now be added, the prohibition of lotteries, betting-houses, brothels, immoral books, licentious pictures, and crime-engendering drinks.)

"Mohamet, not trusting to reason, has sought to put it out of the power of men to misuse strong liquors. If we regard the climate of hot countries, in which wine produces fury rather than stupidity, it will perhaps be found that its total prohibition is more gentle than its permitted use, which would have produced numerous offences, and consequently numerous punishments.*

"Taxes upon spirituous liquors, in part, accomplish the same end. In proportion as the price is raised above the reach of the most numerous class, the means of yielding to intemperance are taken from them. Under this head may be mentioned many English statutes relative to the sale of spirituous liquors : their open exposure to sale is prohibited; it is necessary to obtain a licence which costs much, et cetera.

"To the same head must be referred measures for the destruction of libels, seditious writings, and obscene figures exhibited in the streets, and for preventing their printing and publication.

"By a statute of George III., any individual is forbidden to have more than 50 lbs. of gunpowder in his house; and the dealers in gunpowder are forbidden to have more than 200 lbs. at one time. The reason assigned is the danger of explosions."

Here a man, carrying out such objections as are urged by the press against a Prohibitory liquor law, might say, "I am very careful-why do you limit my liberty because some careless fellow blows his house up? Why not wait till the action is done?" The answer would be, that we care more for the safety of the many than the convenience of the one-that the condition wanted is not the punishment of another, but the protec tion of ourselves-that the punishment after the act, or involved in it, comes too late to remedy the evil-that so far as it operates, it is in the direction of preventing a future calamity of the same kind—and that the past disaster ought to have been prevented by law as much as any apprehended future one. As the only legitimate answer to the claim for protection against the possible danger of explosion would be a proof that such protection must in some other direction largely subtract from human happiness, so in regard to the Liquor Traffic, it must be shown

Alison, in his History of Europe, shows that alcohol is equally the parent of crime in cold countries. "The average amount of crime over all Sweden, equals that of the most depraved cities of Europe." He adds-" So deplorably fallacious is the system which, proceeding on the assumption that the people will of them. selves abstain from such enjoyments as are pernicious, allows them to manufacture, without limit or restraint, this most seducing and dreadful of all physical and moral poisons" (ardent spirit).

that its free operation involves such an amount of rational enjoyment as will counterbalance the varied and prodigious social evils with which it is inseparably associated. BENTHAM proceeds to show, next, that as regards Knowledge, "the policy which would prevent men from acquiring information, would be more hurtful than advantageous. ~All other indirect means which can be employed must, therefore, have reference to the direction of their inclinations; to the putting in practice the rules of a logic too little understood at present the logic of the Will-a logic which often appears in opposition to the logic of the Understanding, as it has been well expressed by the poet

'Video meliora,

Proboque, et deteriora sequor.'

"This contrariety amongst motives often exists only from the unskilfulness of the Legislator-from an opposition which he has himself created between the natural and political sanctions -between the moral and religious sanctions. If he could make all these powers concur towards the same end, all the faculties of the man would be in harmony, and the inclination to injure would no longer exist.* In those cases in which this object cannot be attained, it is proper that the power of the tutelary motives should be made to exceed that of the seductive motives. I shall propose the indirect methods by which the Will may be influenced, in the form of political or moral problems, and I shall show their solution by different examples :

"PROBLEM I. To divert the course of Dangerous Desires. Pernicious desires may arise from three sources:-1st. The malevolent passions; 2nd. The fondness for inebriating liquors; 3rd. The love of idleness.

"The methods of diminishing them may be reduced to three heads-1. The encouraging kindly feeling; 2. The favoring the consumption of non-inebriating liquors, in preference to those which intoxicate; 3. The avoidance of forcing men into a state of idleness.

"No one affection of the human heart ought to be eradicated, since there is not one which does not act its part in the system

*It can hardly be necessary to point out to the intelligent reader, how the Prohibitory Law proposed by the Alliance would accomplish this. First, it would erect the bulwark of Law, the expression of national conscience and will, between the subjects tempted by the Traffic, and the interest of the Traffickers, and by withdrawing all legal licence from the Trade, proclaim its outlawry. Second, it would induce such a state of things, as to allow the appetite for drink to die out, or be reduced within such limits that moral suasion and religion might cope with the evil, with at least some chance of success. Thus a prohibitoprotective Liquor law, would combine the principles both of direct and indirect legislation: while combating a pernicious and artificial desire, by prohibitions and punishments directed against the Traffic that fosters it, would at the same time remove the seductions which tempt to drinking, and the subjectively disturbing element of the drink itself, that occasions degradation, disorder, and crimein short, as BENTHAM expresses it, would operate "by weakening the seductive motives, which excite to evil, and by fortifying the tutelary motives, which excite to good."

of utility. The desire for intoxicating liquors is, properly speaking, the only one which can be extirpated without producing any

evil.

"PROBLEM II. To make such arrangements that a given Desire may be satisfied without prejudice, or with the least possible prejudice.+

"That these desires may be satisfied without prejudice—is the first object; but if they cannot be regulated to this point, that their satisfaction may not produce so great an injury to the community as that which results from a violated law-such is the second object. If even this cannot be attained, to arrange everything in such manner that the individual, placed by his desires between two offences [or modes of action], may be led to choose the least hurtful-such is the third object. This last is a species of composition with vice: a bargain is made with it, so to speak, and it is sought that the individual may be satisfied at the least possible expense.

وو

The licence law, and magisterial and police surveillance, are standing illustrations of the facts that the Traffic requires to be regulated that such regulation has not succeeded in securing exemption from very great injury to the nation, in the mode of allowing restricted public facilities for the gratifying of the Drinker's desire and that it has been nothing less than a composition with the source of vice, and a bargain made by Bad Policy with Selfishness and Sensualism, at the expense of the best interests of the Community, three-fourths of whom do not support the Traffic. On the other hand, the Alliance claims, not to dictate what 'desires,' good or bad, the citizen shall gratify, but only that the how and where of the indulgence shall not become the source of grave public injury, or so far as it does so, or tends to do so, shall come under the surveillance of the Law.

To

MR CHARLES DICKENS, in an amusing, champagne-y article, objects that the 4,999 sober Job Smiths who can conduct themselves properly, ought not to be inconvenienced for the sake of one solitary Drunken Stiggins here and there who can not. which the reply is, that nobody purposes to hinder Job Smith from brewing or drinking his pot of beer-that the law already puts sober Job to 'inconvenience,' for some good reason affecting the public safety-than he cannot even now get his drink any

+ Let it be noted here, that the passion for strong drink, cannot be placed in the category of natural desires; nor even be compared with the liability of abuse that attaches to the sale of poisons in general, which nevertheless demand severe restrictions upon their sale that are sometimes inconvenient. Nature, which has implanted no appetite for Alcoholic drink within us, has supplied us with no Alcoholic fruit or fountain without us. The subject of the Traffic, like its agent and instrument, is artificial and peculiar-it is quite unique, sui generis-and must, therefore, be tried on its own specific nature, and adjudged, as a matter of fact, by the evidence of its own fruits (29). For the sake of argument, however, we will suppose that the desire for the private, limited use of alcoholic liquor, may be gratified" without prejudice to society," or with so little prejudice as not to demand legal oversight and interference.

where, and at any time-that the Job Smiths are not many but few, and that the Stigginses are not few but many;-in fine, that Mr Dickens's logic proves too much, and his arithmetic too little,—that the gratification which he and his equally sober friends experience in the flavor of Burgundy or Brown Stout, is not to be regarded as a satisfactory set-off against the widespread pauperism, demoralization, and crime traceable to the Traffic for which they plead, and the burdens and pains which its supporters cast upon millions who protest against it as a nuisance and a curse. In the name of reason, and for the sake of humanity (not of the drunkard), these invoke the sovereignty of the Law to prevent the Sale of Strong drink under such conditions as actually lead to the multiplication of pauperized, brutal, and dangerous Stigginses, and thereby imperil the high purposes and security of social life.

"PROBLEM III. To prohibit Accessory Offences, in order to prevent their Principals.-Those acts which have a connexion with a pernicious event, as its cause [or part of it], may be considered as accessory offences in relation to the principal offence.

"The following are examples of what may be done under the head of Police. Prohibition of purely offensive arms, which are easily hidden. Prohibition of the sale of poisons requires that a catalogue be made of poisonous substances; the sale of them cannot, however, be altogether forbidden ;* it can only be regulated and subjected to precautions requiring that the seller should know the purchaser, that he should have witnesses of the sale [and of its alleged use], that he should register the sale in a separate book, etc."

Now, it may be observed that the Law of Maine does no more in reference to strong drink. It is not an absolute prohibition, but a regulated sale, for specified purposes-and, we presume, none save a petrified theorist would object to all legislation of this type. It does not regard the Public-house as the evil, but it regards the Traffic and the Trafficker as accessories to the excitement, disorder, and crime-effects whereof other citizens justly complain.

§3. In the United States of America an extreme doctrine has been developed by STEPHEN PEARL ANDREWS, in a work, entitled 'The True Constitution of Government.' It is announced as "The Sovereignty of the Individual, to be exercised at his own cost." He adds "The term 'cost' is elected as a scientific

"Every active medicine, taken in a certain dose, is a Poison."-BENTHAM'S note. It is a fact, that in the Catalogue of Poisons in the works of Toxicologists (see Orfila, Dunglison, Taylor, and Christison), ALCOHOL takes its place amongst those of the narcotico-acrid class, in company with digitalis, camphor, strychnine, etc. It is perfectly true that drinkers and dealers have no intention of killing either themselves or their neighbors with alcoholic liquor-that they only drink for pleasure, and deal for profit-but the actual consequences, undenied and undeniable, are a thousand times more dreadful than those following the sale of all other poisons put together.