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Show I TWO YEARS OF PROHIBITION---AN UNBIASED REPORT j I DRINKING CUT 60 SINCE LAW WENT INTO EFFECT Forthwith Is Presented a Survey of Accomplishments in Dry Era and Harmful Results of Enforcement. QUANTITIES OF LIQUOR SMUGGLED; CRIME AND INSANITY DECREASE Nation Still Has Many Wet Spots Where Public Refuses to Respect Law and Flood of Illicit Rum Flows in Giant Traffic of Bootlegging. y Copyright . lOtt, ty Tin N'rw ToiK Heiau The Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States prohibiting the manufacture, salo or transportation of Intoxicating liquors, became effectlvo two years ago. January 16, 1920, was the date it wont Into effect. For two years, therefore, national prohibition has been the law of the land, the amendment having withstood all attacks upon !t, and the various j enforcement acts, national and State, having likewise survive Ionic, costly onrt Kittr-rlv frmcrht HI trn Mon I Claims and counter claims, as to the effectiveness or non-effectlvness erf the law, asrertions that It 1b of great benefit to the public, charges that it Is working great harm to the country allegations that It has no public support and will never bo a success, have abounded since first the law went Into effect and continue to-day There la tho utmost confusion as to whether prohibition actually prohibits or Is merely a costly nuisance. The simple claim that there is less drinking of alcoholic lquors than there was before January 16, 1920, is disputed. What are the facts? Results of Enforcement From Many Angles. In an effort to lay the facts as they aotually are before its readers. The New York Herald and this newspaper has gathered from every section of tho country, through Its correspondents and otherwise, a nia of data and statistics as to the conditions which prevail at tho present time, and which show whether the prohibition law has decreased tho consumption of Intoxicating liquor, whether the law is being enforced, whether the law is a benefit to tho various vari-ous communities and whether the whole situation to-day Is an Improvement oer the situation prevailing two years ago. In compiling and presenting the material It has gathered, this newspaper will maintain the strictest impartiality. It does not seek to show that prohibition pro-hibition is a good thing or a bad thing, that it is beneficial or deleterious. It will not seek either to make out a case for the "wets" or a case for the "drys." It will call attention to contributing causes or conditions which may servo to modify or qualify conclusions that partisans might draw It will present in a series of articles tho facts as It has learned them, and let those facts speak for themselves Starting with a general survey of conditions prevailing throughout tho country, this series will take up in turn the economic results of the prohibition pro-hibition law, the sociological results, tho violations of the law and the ramifications thereof, tho enforcement of the law and tho results therefrom, tho actual working out of tho law in individual States and, finally, tho conditions which prevail In what Is generally known as "tho wettest State In the Union " Records From Supporters and Opponents. In preparation of this series Tho New York Herald and this newspaper has had before it, first of all, special detailed reports from Its own correspondents. correspond-ents. It has had, too, the records of tho Anti-Saloon League of America, records of organizations opposed to prohibition, records of governmental departments, ratlnal and State, and records of enforcement agencies, courts, asylums. Ac. it Xaturallv. In matter gathered from such a variety of sources, there are c,,n- Itradictlons Where such are found the In considering prohibition conditions In the United Btates as a whole, it is recossary to draw attention to the fact that of tho forty-elcht States In the Union thlrty-thr.e were dry before the passage of tho Eighteenth Amendment. Astonishing as it may seem, some of 'hesc States that were dry before national na-tional prohibition went Into enTect, now contain, admittedly, some of the wettest spots In the count ry. Reference is made "specially to Georgia, Tcxai and Oregon It will be noted that those three States are border States, one on the Atlantic, one on the Gul.' of Mexico bordering on Mexico and one on the Pacific They serve to iniphas it a point which many of the reports made bring out : That much of the Uq.'or consumption in this country to-day is only possible because .f tho activities of smugglers No FlR-nro on tmtiKicMiiK. This la highly important. In view or the 3gures occarlonnll printed by one 'do or tho othc'- of the wet and dry controversy. Ar. Indication of what ii means Is given In a dispatch from the correspondent 1 Detroit : ' The whole ,'lstrlct between Port Huron and tho mouth of the Detroit Hlver. a distance of approximately tight y miles, 1? l. boon.; runners' fairyland, fairy-land, wherein the smuggling of liquor has become, a :cle-ntlflc Industry, accomplished ac-complished b d termlned experts. Thero is no way of accurately estimating the amount of llquo- that crosses the river, Lut a conservat.' e figure la 1.000 cases every twenty-fojr hours. ' Tho purpose in calling attention to this point Immediately and in connection connec-tion with the statement regarding Georgia. Geor-gia. Texas and Oregon, is this; There is no possible way of determining, deter-mining, with any accuracy, what the consumption of Intoxicating liquor Is at present In the United States. Reports received from tho most reliable re-liable sources indicate clearly that, with very few exceptions, in districts whero conditions are propitious, rum runners and bootlecrgers are excessively busy, dolnp a good business, and apparently appar-ently finding a ready market, at hlh prices, for what they have to off' r. There Is no possible way of checking the amount of liquor these men handle "Where conditions are propitious. "" this state of affairs prevails Naturally the seaboard and border States are tho ones where conditions aro best suited to the muggier! activities. There remains the other half of the country, those sections away from tho seaboard and the border. With tho exception of a few very wet spots, that part of tho United States fact will be noted. not adjacent to either the Atlantic or tho Pacific ocean or the Canadian or the Mexican borders In fairly dry. but bone drynets Is almost unknown In th'j cities, Knna Anions; Drjfnt States. Kansas Is probably ns dry' as any Stato in the country'. Judging by the reports re-ports received. Yet the Topeka correspondent corre-spondent writes: "By reason of Topeka s nearness to Kansas City, Mo through all these years a 'wef city, the fight against the liquor traffic has been continuous. . . . At every session of the legislature special spe-cial appropriations are made for the use of the attomey-generul and other officers offi-cers In hunting down violators of the State prohibition law " And Kansas, by popular vote, went dry forty-two years ago! Beyond the fact that bone dryness docs not seem to exist In any community com-munity of size, thero is "scarcely a statement state-ment regarding prohibition that can he fairly made and applied generally to all sections of the country. Conditions vary from what might be termed "near dryness" dry-ness" to exceeding wetness. In the order of their wetness, with the wettest at the top of the list and the driest at the bottom, bot-tom, the States are ranked as follows by the prohibition officials In Washington Wash-ington : New York Kliorlx Inland 'llferals lomi OMo Colorado North C'nri;lina I nnllnrm Georgia Florida Illinois U n-lilrnton Mn-Miehusetts New Jrnipj Missouri YTKrnniln Ian r Mrlro Tfnmnsfe Orrcon KrntnrkT I tali MlaneaoM Mississippi onneetlcal Wwimlnc ircinin Nebraska Indlnnu Nrw Hiimpxlilre Pennsylvania Idaho Arkansas Arlrnna Mlrhlcnn Maine south Carolina North Dakota M:irlani rmionl Alabama South Dakota Oklahoma Net uda West Virginia KsnSM Montana Drlawnrr It will be noted that Kansas Is ranked as next to the driest State In the country- It should be emphasized, too, that this list Is bacd on Information ob-talnej ob-talnej from the enforcement officers In Washington, D. C. u 1 1 h d rn i-. ' - Drop 88 Per Cent. The statement ha? been made above that there Is no way of determining, even approximately, the amount of liquor consumed at this time Notwithstanding this the flat statement was made from a "dry" headquarters a few days since "There has been an enormous decrease I In the consumption of liquor, a decrease of not less than s.'i and possibly more I than DO per cent.' This assertion does not seem to bo quite fully borne out by the statlstle.i available. Official reports from Wash- i Ington covering twenty-eight months up to October 31 last, and therefore embracing em-bracing a part of the war time prohibition prohibi-tion period, shows that tho total of withdrawals by Government permit of alcoholic spirits was 27.211,627 gallons, whereas for a corresponding period he-fore he-fore prohibition the withdrawals totaled 223.000,000. The Washington correspondent corre-spondent writes : "Withdrawals for the prohibition period pe-riod are thus seen to be but 12 per cent, of the withdrawals for the corresponding perloil Immediately preceding prohibition" prohibi-tion" Illicit Itnm Not TuliDl.itrd. On the face of the returns, therefore, the decrense In consumption Is 88 per cent., but this takes no account what-ever what-ever of smuggled liquor, moonshine whisky, private stock laid In before the ; law became effective, liquor obtained by I fraudulent permit or otherwise Illegally ; or "homo brew." It will bo seen at once that consumption must bo actually greater than the 15 por cent, that the prohibition statement quoted above puts i as the maximum Tho Washington correspondent further writes "Under prohibition alcoholic spirits i r,. being withdrawn from bond at tho rate of 972,000 gallons a month, the official reports show. The rate of withdrawals with-drawals before prohibition was 8,000.000 gallons a month ' This shows plainly that tho rate ef withdrawal is still about 12 per cent., or a little more, or what It was prior to prohibition. Present withdrawals, however. how-ever. Include those of grain alcohol for Industrial purposes. Somo gTaln alcohol finds Its way to the bootleggers, but moro Is legitimately used. It Is worthy of note In discussing the. total consumption of liquor In the United States at present that exports of spirits from Great Britain to this country and to Canada have Increased onormouslv within the last two years In a similar manner tho exports of wines from France have Increased The details as to these exports will be given later. But oven figuring practically all of iho Increases, exports of Great Britain and France as destined for eventual consumption In the United 9tates, It la Impoesiblo to arrive at a figure that ma-, terlally Increase the percentage already given. Considering all factors, It Is onlv possible to account nctually for liquor totaling about 15 per cent, of the amount consumed In tho country before prohibition. pro-hibition. There remains to be dealt with. then. ! the illicitly made "hootch" and "homo brew." Stills have been found by officers offi-cers In all parts of the country and in all sorts of places. There must he a very considerable quantity of liquor manufactured, sold and consumed, but hpw much no one can say. Nor Is there any way of finding out how much moonshine moon-shine of the old sort Is being made in tho Southern States, One guess Is almost al-most as good as another. But If. in order to be exceedingly liberal, lib-eral, one goes to the extreme and arbitrarily ar-bitrarily says thet the lUlictly manu- j factured liquor Is equal In amount to all of that released From the wn re houses, plus all of that which Is f xnorted to thi. country by GfVat Britain, either direct-ly direct-ly or through Cnnndn. nnd all of that exported to this country by France, the highest figure obtainable In another 13 per cent Thero can be no pretense that this Is an acurate basis for figuring, but It has the value of being liberal. Ar.d It lends to this conclusion The total consumption of liquor In the United States to-day cannot be more than 30 per cent, of the consumption prior to prohibition. Judging from the reports sent In by correspondents the success or failure of prohibition In given localities depel di largely on the attitude of the public In the particular locality. Prohibition is neither pouplar nor unpopular. In Nn York and Chicago, for Instance, the ease with which the law Is violated and evaded Is ascribed as due. In part at least, to the general apathy of the public. pub-lic. Prohibition Is not popular. On the other hand In States where the violations viola-tions of the law are not much more numerous nu-merous that violations of the homicide or similar laws, It Is reported that prohibition pro-hibition Is ixjpular , that prohobltlon Is popular; that enforcement has the acVe support of the public and that oftlclals arc responsive to the senIment of the majority. It appears, too that there l much general interest Just now In what prohibition pro-hibition Is costing the taxpayers This Is undoubtedly duo to the Interest taken at present in all matters of taxation. It is general knowledge that a source of much Government revenue was shut off wh;-n the prohibition law became effective. effec-tive. Knowing that this loss has to be made up, and Is made up, many persons who are now more keenly aware of their taxes than cv-r before, want to know how costly to the taxpayers Ik the law against the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors. Heavy Lose in Taxei, Prohibition costs the Federal Government Govern-ment more than f350.000.000 a year In loss of taxes alone. There In. In i Idi-tlon, Idi-tlon, the heavy cost of enforces "tit and the cost of the additional burden put on the courts by reason of tho activities of Uio enforcement officers. Thr- figures of tho receipts of the Government for tho fiscal year before prohibition and the last fiscal year follow Tear Rrcrlpta. 1018 Jn.t U9.SU 1921 H'.C2Z, t23 Decrease .$881 216. ll These figures are for fiscal years ending end-ing June 30. It Is estimated that for the calendar year 192J the receipts will be about J70 000,000 Here Is some further Information aooui liquor taxrs i.iKcn irom a social report of the Washington prohibition ofllce : "Following the civil war tho Government Govern-ment loked about for means of raising ronue For the tlr.-t tlmi liquor was faxed at the rate of 20 rents per gallon, and during the year 1863, I6.805.4fi4 was collected. I-atcr the tax was In-1 creased to 60 cents . still Inter to $2 a gallon, and In 1 x?t f61, 925,82 was collected. col-lected. Production falling off, the Gov. eminent reduced the tax to 60 cents a gallon, then Increased It to $1.10. at which figure It remained for 23 y. ar; resulting In the following collection for the year 1S90 $107.6"3.000. "Next the tax was Increased to $3.20 and to-day the rate Is $6 40 per gallon for beverage purposes and $2.20 for non-bevcrace purposes. 1 During 1920 the tax collection was $130,871,140. compared with $208,601.-600 $208,601.-600 In 1910. For the present fiscal year owing to check being placed by Commissioner Commis-sioner Ha nes on withdrawals It Is estimated esti-mated that the collections will be ap-proximatel ap-proximatel one-half of that of last year." Ri Kline I.oici OfTsct. There are substantial offsets against the apparent loss of over $.1".".ni n a year In taxes. Figures for tax col-! col-! ' ' 1 j 1 -! led all an. i """"via- "Va iia mi.owlq AubitanjiiUj lncrr.Too, nnd while there Is no way Ol ' ' "lining tho fact, tho claim hi made that the Increased attendance at such i Places Is due in a measure nt least, to prohibition. Then there nre the seizures ; which have brought in some revenue and the fines for violation of the law, which aggregate a substantial amount' i Increased taxes collected on soft drinks also have to bo taken Into consideration. j No calculation as to what proportion i Of those Increased collections Is due to 'prohibition la possible. But aside from the revenue (hat the Federal Government loses there has been j a loss to the Stnte and In some places to the , ty governments whl-h is Incalculable. In-calculable. Tho loss to tho State of New York alone. Tor Instance, during the years montloned. la Indicated In the following table of excise tax collections ,i.m Tax Receipts. Decrease. $22.oi0 To- (normal year) 21" li.OOO.ooo ill.OVO '.: " 4.OS0.0OO ls.oiojav ,"1 - 22.000.703 Ixs of revenue In three years. $31. 102. IIS In other States tho loss will have VarlSd according to whether or not they had prior to two years ago license law's bringing In substantia, tevenue which I waei cut ofT. As many of ihe States had I euch laws, tho total loss of revenue must of necessity have been very great Another question that has arisen In connection with tho prohibition law end Its enforcement Is; Has prohibition brought prosperity? Tho answers of tho correspondents to this question vary' so widely that It Is apparent other factors far outwolgh prohibition in their bearing on the question of prosperity In the country or In certain localities and that there Is no ! it.-iuii io suppose proniouion is responsible respon-sible for cither prosperity or hard tlmca In one respect nearly all of the reports re-ports received agreo In substance. A marked decrease in crlmo has been noted the country over during the period since, the national prohibition act went Into effect. It Is true that tho last few months have seen greater activity on the part of criminals and numerous Instances In-stances nearly everywhere of spectacular spectacu-lar lawlessness. Where mis has been noted It has been explained as due to the economic situation, unemployment and the after the war break down of morals In spite of It the Jail and pcnltentln r records show that crime his decreaoed In tho last two years materially. Hospital Hos-pital nnd other records show too, that Insanity has decreased. SnmmnrT- of Kconomtc Results. ii wouia seem, inereiore, iron- me re-Torts re-Torts received, tho details of whl- h will be taken up later under different headings, head-ings, that two years of prohibition have trought these results The smuggling of a vast quantity of liquor into tho United States and th-. Il.egal manufacture of perbapc as much again. Tho decrease In the consumption of Intoxicating liquor by approximately 70 per cent, making a liberal allowance for unknown factor? The cutting off of more than $350.-C $350.-C 00,000 a year of the revenue o. the United States Government and a great but unknown loss of revenue to the State nnd municipal governments. The Increasing of the revenue of the' Government from the sale of theater and other amusement tickets and froni the sab of soil drinks. The .substantial and general decrease In crime and tti Insanity cases. Inasmuch as specific mention has been made In this article of tho conditions prevailing In three of the States that wero dry before national prohibition went Into effect. It U only fair that the ; authority for these statements be given I The States mentioned were Georgia, Texn-i and Oregon Following ; ,n , x. 1 1 li t from tho correspondent In Atlanta, Ga. : I 'Georgia, dry nominally since 1308, has banished her barrooms but not her liquor, has mado a fortune for mnny a i bootlegger, has enabled many a farmer I to forget the low price brought by eot-I eot-I ton and corn, has changed the color from I red to white, has hiked the price to the l skies, and has greatly aldod underpaid ofTlccrs of the law through the proceed I of the salo of captured automobiles, booze laden 'There In probably more liquor In Atlanta At-lanta now than there was before prohibition. pro-hibition. It Is estimated that there are some 2.000 bootleggers In Atlanta. There nre more cases of violation of tho law In Atlanta and Georgia now than ever before In the history of the State" So much for Georgia for the tlmo being. Now as to Texas. Following is nn extract from a dispatch from San Antonio: "Texas will not he bone dry nor even approximate that state until Mexico, tho great source of supply, takes the pledge, according to prohibition ngents and custom officials Manufacture of moonshine whisky from corn. too. Is belnjr followed zealously In every section of tho State as frequent dry raids develop. de-velop. Home brewers there are, too, of course. In unknown quantities. "Liquor can be had over the bar at crrtnln plnces ln San Antonio nnd In other principal etr.j Cases of -bonded Whlaky can be procured easll from liquor runners operating from the Mexican border to Inland piints. Many of the well to do have unfailing private Mockr. A still or brewery is raided almost dalK here bv Federal prohibition agents. In Federal Court at El Pasn about 150 liquor cases, the heaviest docket In the history of the court, were disposed of In the last term of court" Trice I nt in Oregon. That Is a part of the tale from Texas From Oregon comes the following, via Portland : "A steadily declining price with Increased In-creased quantities of both moonshine and factory manufactured liquor, plus a steady Increase In arrest this tells the - nt '!, lntl I nr. HMM nl nrnhlKIHn. In Portland and for Otegon generally. ' Liquor sold for $20 a hottle a year ago. To-day booze from Canada or off bootleg ships from the Orient will be d -llvercd at the door for around $95 ind $100 a case that Is. about $8 or $v r,o a bottle. Homes that never knew llqujr before prohibition are the locations of miniature factories to-day. turning out wine ln 25, 50 and 100 gallon lota The result of this has been an Increase hi the number of women drinkers In Oregon In Portland In particular." These quotations are given here nnb-for nnb-for the reason that the three States m singled out In the beginning as furnish-Ihg furnish-Ihg examples of a certain condition. Each of these States was dry before Jan 16. 1920. The quotations tell a part of the story of these States, but only r. p;irt And they come from only three States of the forty-eight In the countrv Other States may furnish an cntlr.vy different account of themselves. |