society, legislators thought to guard against these evils, by providing that none should sell it except respectable men; and no more of them than the public good required; and that they should sell only to such men as would not be injured by it.

But as it is now known that all who drink it are injured by it, and that the public good, instead of requiring, forbids that any should sell it; and that licensing it, while it authorises, and perpetuates the traffic, does not and cannot prevent its evils, the whole foundation of that legislation which authorises and licenses its continuance is entirely swept away. It has nothing to stand upon; and were the traffic not upheld by the rum party, and those who hope to make money by it, it would fall of itself; and under the long accumulated and mighty weight with which it has burdened the community, it would sink to rise no more. Let legislators and all respectable men cease to sanction it, and the last relic which makes it even tolerable in a civilized community, will be removed. None will engage in it but the abandoned, who carry the mark of infamy on their foreheads, and who are hastening rapidly, to their own place.

But it is said, "The licensing of the traffic is a source of revenue to the State, and therefore the public good requires it." This revenue is much like that of the woman who sold her grain and her rags to purchase whiskey for her children. She said it was cheaper to keep them on whiskey, than on bread; and as it made a market for her rags, it was a source of profit; in governmental language, of revenue. Her garments and those of her children were soon nearly all rags, and all sold; when her revenue had become such that she and her children, as a public burden, were obliged, by a public tax, to be supported at the almshouse.

This well illustrates the principle and the effect of raising revenue from ardent spirit. What are the facts? In the county of Baltimore, Maryland, the support of pauperism, nearly the whole of which was occasioned by the sale and use of spirit, cost in 1830, more than $20,000. From which, deduct between eight and nine thousand, the revenue obtained, leaving between thirteen and fourteen thousand dollars, in that single item, to come from the same source with the support of the woman whose revenue was so important, the pockets of the people. To this also ought to be added in balancing the account, the cost of crimes, idleness, dissipation, sickness, and the various other evils occasioned by it. And will not the people, for the sake of being relieved of the burdens, be willing to dispense with the revenue? Is there a man in the community, unless a rum-seller, or drinker, or one who hopes to make money, or obtain influence by the use of spirit, who will wish to retain it? If so, let him be called to bear in his own person and family all the evils which it occasions, and he will change his mind

The warden of the prison in Baltimore states that 2322 criminals were the same year committed to that prison; and that 424 of them were intoxicated, when they were brought there; and that in his opinion, eight tenths of the whole were intemperate men.

The expenses of the city of New York in 1832, as stated in the Report of the Comptroller, were $893,886 29,-$685,385 74 of which were raised by a direct tax. The support of the criminal, pauper, and civil establishment cost $315,782 98; and the Cholera, in addition to all public and private charities, and individual expenditures, cost $102,57585,-making $418,358 83; by far the greatest proportion of which, as well as almost innumerable other evils, were the fruits of about 3000 spirit venders, licensed to deal out the poison to about 210,000 souls. And what do these men pay as a compensation for the enormous mischiefs which they occasion? $22,157. And, say a most respectable committee of gentlemen in that city, after investigating this subject, "We, the people, pay about $400,000 more than we should if no drams were sold or drunk in the city. Suppose that only half of the expenses of Cholera were occasioned by drinking, and five sixths of the criminal, police, and pauper establishments; and one half of the salaries of officers, it would amount to $302,099 15, which is now paid as a tax for licensed vices; over $10,000 taken from the earnings of the people for every licensed grogshop which pays $10 into the treasury." What right have legislators to make laws, which in their operation thus tax the community, and take away the hard earnings of the people?

The grand jury of the city and county of New York, after careful examination, say that they have come to the deliberate conclusion, that if this source of vice and misery were at an end, three quarters of the crimes and pauperism of the city would be prevented, together with an incalculable amount of wretchedness, that does not come under the cognizance of law. And they add, "It is our solemn impression that the time has now arrived when our public authorities should no longer sanction the evil complained of, by granting licenses for the purpose of vending ardent spirit; thereby legalising the traffic, at the expense of our moral, intellectual and physical power.

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Of 653, who were in one year committed to the house of Correction in Boston, 453 were drunkards. And the overseer states, that many of the others who were committed as vagabonds, might, with equal propriety, be called drunkards; and that his opinion is, that there were not ten among the whole who were not in the habit of the excessive use of ardent spirit; that intemperance is almost the sole cause of all the commitments, that those who were committed as pilferers were almost all drunkards, and that probably they would not pilfer if they could not procure rum with the articles which they have stolen.

Is it not manifestly vicious for legislators to sanction a business which produces such results? They are elected by the people, and sent to legislate for the purpose of preventing crime, not producing it. And a vast portion of all their time is now occupied in making laws to punish crimes, which their own legislation produces. And the people are taxed millions of dollars annually, to sustain the burden occasioned by that legislation. Will the people of this free country longer endure it? They punish the criminals, and legalise the traffic that makes them. Like the father, who, to prevent his son from swearing, swore that if he did swear, he would visit him with his wrath; and with about as much wisdom as the man, who, when asked what should be done by fathers to keep their sons from being ruined by ardent spirit, answered, "Why, they must drink it all themselves."

They build prisons, and license men to carry on the trade that fills them; erect lunatic asylums, and furnish their tenants; the people build almshouses, and the magistrates license paupermaking manufactories to fill them, augment fourfold the public burdens, and tenfold the personal and domestic wretchedness of the country. And when the people rise, as they now often do, and will more often in future, and vote that they will not have such nuisances among them, the county commissioners, or some petty officers clothed with a little brief authority, come in and gravely declare, that "the public good require them;" and thus again load the community with burdens. This is legal oppression, legislative tyranny; and it leaves behind it a deep and stinging sense of injustice. A few retailers have the profit of making paupers, and the people have to support them; and then when they complain of the palpable injustice, to be told, "The public good requires it!" This is too much; and it needs no spirit of prophecy to announce that the time is not distant when men born to be free, who have the power and the heart to be free, will not endure it. A few men, for their own pecuniary profit, will not long be suffered, under the sanction of law, thus to burden the community.

Of 3000 persons admitted to the workhouse in Salem, Mass., the superintendent states, that in his opinion 2900 were brought there directly or indirectly by intemperance. The superintendent of the almshouse in New York states, that the number of male adults in the house is 572, of which there are not 20 that can be called sober men; that the number of females is 601, and that he doubts whether there are 50 of them, that can be called sober women.

In the city of Boston, for six years, there were upon an average, 247 commitments annually to a single prison, for drunkenness; and 95 drunkards were committed to the penitentiary, in a single month.

A distinguished jurist in the city of New York, acquainted with the courts, stated, that he could find but three cases of mu der

committed in that city for fifteen years, except under the influence of liquor. Legislators hang murderers, and license the business that makes them; but not without becoming, if they know what they do, sharers in the guilt. They expend millions to prevent disease, and license the business which produces it, and renders it doubly fatal; but not without being accessory to the consigning of multitudes to a premature grave, and a miserable eternity.

Is it not true then, and may not long afflicted and suffering humanity lift up her head with exultation, that the time is approaching, when, in the language of the chancellor of the State of New York, "reflecting men will no more think of erecting and renting grogshops as a means of gain, than they would now think of poisoning the well from which a neighbor obtains water for his family; or arming a maniac to destroy his own life and the lives of those around him?" And may we not add, when reflecting legislators too, will no more think of sanctioning the one by law, than they would now think of sanctioning the other? And when there shall not be a christian legislator under heaven, whose countenance would not turn pale, and whose tongue would not cleave to the roof of his mouth, should he attempt to speak in favor of it. In the city of Washington, the revenue from the sale of ardent spirit was about $6000; and the loss, as estimated by Judge Cranch, occasioned by it, was probably not less, all things considered, than $100,000. Revenue then does not require the sale of ardent spirit.*

But it is said, and grave legislators sometimes echo the declaration, "It ought to be licensed, and the use of it encouraged, to make a market for the coarse grains, in order to promote the agricultural interests of the country.' 99 But where the drinking of spirit prevails most, agriculture, other things being equal, uniformly flourishes least; and thus, like every show of argument on that side, it is totally opposed to facts; as well as to reason, religion, morality, patriotism, and even to humanity.

Many grain growers will not now sell to distillers. They deem it a crime to feed those fountains of death, yet their grains find a market, and they are often among the most prosperous men in their vicinity. It does not appear, that any more dismal prospect than that of others, is opening before their children.

In the year 1810 it was estimated that between five and six million bushels of grain were distilled in the United States. Suppose in 20 years it was doubled, and that in 1830, 12,000,000 bushels were thus destroyed; and that this, to the growers who of course obtained their pay, was worth 50 cts. a bushel, $6,000,000. The annual cost of crime and of pauperism produced by the use * Appendix H.

of ardent spirit has been estimated at $7,050,000. Subtract from this the price of the grain, and you have from these two items alone, a loss of $1,500,000. Say the Committee of the New York State Society, "Since the farmers have begun to open their eyes to the evils growing out of the turning of the staff of life into a substance to destroy it, and have made use of their coarse grains for bread stuffs, or to feed their cattle, they have steadily advanced in price." And they calculate that the change produced by the Temperance Reformation, now saves the State of New York several million dollars a year.

Let all farmers use their grains to increase the number and value of their horses, cattle and hogs; not to diminish the number and value of men, and they will find it to be, to themselves and their country, great gain.

Others say, "The object of licensing is not to encourage the sale and use of spirit, but to restrain and prevent it." To this there are two answers. The first is, it does not restrain and prevent it It has been tried effectually, for more than half a century; and its fruits have been manifested in the living wretchedness, and in the dying agonies of more than a million of men. Notwithstanding all such restraints and preventions, the evil constantly increased, till it had well nigh proved our ruin. The other answer is, the licensing of sin is not the way to prevent or restrain it, but it is the way to sanction and perpetuate it; by declaring to the community that, if practised legally, it is right; and thus preventing the efficacy of truth and facts in producing the conviction that it is wrong.

But says one, "By saying that none except respectable men shall sell ardent spirit, and they only in limited numbers, we do not say that for them to sell it, is right. Would a law which should forbid men to ride horseback, upon worldly business, on the Sabbath, be saying, or would it imply, that for them to journey on that day for such a purpose on foot would be right?" Suppose it would not; but suppose also that legislators should go farther, and make a law, that as many as the public good should require, and should pay a dollar, should have a legal right to travel in that way, on worldly business, on the Sabbath; and that certain men should be appointed actually to license a number in every neighborhood for that purpose, and should license them, notwithstanding all reasons and remonstrances against it; would it not be saying, and by the whole weight of legislation, in opposition to truth, that it is morally right for those men to travel as the law prescribes? or else, that legal right and moral right are in this case, in opposition? And would it not be declaring also, in opposition to truth, that the public good requires this? and thus tend to increase the difficulties, by moral means, of convincing men that it is wicked? Who can doubt but that it would operate, and from the nature of the case