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6
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS
IN THE
HOUSE OF COMMONS OF THE IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT,
IN THE SESSION OF 1834,
RELATIVK TO AN
INQUIRY INTO THE EXTENT, CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES
OP THE
PREVAILING VICE OF INTOXICATION,
WITH EXTRACTS
FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OP THE SAID HOUSE
ON THE SUBJECT.
ALSO,
AN INCIDENT ON THE MAINE LAW-
Toronto :
PRINTED BY THOMAS H. BENTLEY,
AT THE OFFICE OF THE CHRISTIAN GUARDIAN.
No. », Wellington BcitoiNas, Kino Street.
1853.
i
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS.
In the parliamentary session above mentioned,
James Silk Buckingham, Esq., then one of the
Members for ShejQSeld, moved in the House for
the adoption of the following resolution : —
" That a select committee be appointed to in-
<|uire into the extent, causes and consequences of
the prevailing vice of intoxication among the
labouring classes of the United Kingdom, in order
to ascertain whether any legislative measures can
be devised to prevent the fui'ther spread of so
great a national evil."
The motion was oj^posed by Lord Althorpe,
on the part of the Government, and by several
others ; but on a division, after Mr. Buckingham's
reply to the various objections that were urged,
it was carried against the Government; the unex-
pected majority being received with loud cheers;
and the following committee, in which almost
every part of Great Britain and Ireland was re-
presented, was appointed. [Here the names are
given of the 38 membei-s composing the coir.-
mittee, among whom are Mr. Buckingham, as
Chairman ; Lord Althorpe, Chancellor of the
Exchequer; Sir Robert Peel; Mr. Baring; Mr.
Hawes; Alderman Wood ; Serj't Lefoy; Sir An-
drew Agnew, and other distinguished gentlemen.]
The list of witnesses will be foimd to embrace
men of various ranks, professions and localities,
so that their experience was gathered over an ex-
sensive range of countries and occupations ; and
on the evidence elicited from them after many
days of ]jatient examination, extending from the
9th of June to the 28th July, 1834, both inclu-
sive, an elaborate Report, from which the following
extracts are made, was agreed to by the Commit-
tee,which Report in full, was subsequently adopted
by the House, and was ordered to be printed
among its records.
Extracts from the Report, &c.
Consequences to Individual Character.
*' That the consequences of the vice of intoxi-
cation among the humbler classes, and the preva-
lence of intemperate habits, and pernicious cus-
toms among the middle and higher ranks, are so
many and so fearful to contemplate, that it is as
diflScult as it is painful to enumerate even the
outlines of them."
" That the following ai'e only a few of the
evils directly springing from this baneful source :
"1. Destruction of health ; disfjase in every fonn
and shape ; premature decrepitude in the old ;
stunted growth and general debility and decay
in the young ; loss of life by p aroxysms, apoplex-
ies, drownings, burnings, and accidents of various
kinds; delirium ti-emens, (one of the most awful
afflictions of humanity) ; parallysis, idiotcy, mad-
ness and violent deaths, — an proved by numerous
medical witnesses, who have made this the sub-
ject of their long and careful investigation.
" 2. Destruction of mental capacity and vigor,
and extinction of aptitude for learning, as well as
of disposition for practicing any useful ait or in-
dustrious occupation.
" 3. Irritation of all the worst passions of the
heart, — hatred, anger, revenge, with a bi*utaliza-
tion of disposition that breaks asunder and destroys
the most endearing bonds of natui*e and society.
4. " Extinction of all moral and religious princi-
ple, disregard of truth, indifference to education,
violation of chastity, insensibility to shame, and
indescribable degi'adation ; as proved by Clergy-
men, Magistrates, Overseei-s, Teachers, and others
examined by your Committee on all these points."
■IP
6
Consequences to National Welfare.
" Among others, the following evils may be
distinctly traced : —
" 1. The destruction of an immense amount of
wholesome and nutritious grain given by a boun-
tiful Providence for the food of man, which is
now by distillation converted into a poison ; the
highest medical authorities examined, in gi'eat
numbers before your Committee, being uniform
in their testimony that ardent spirits are absolute-
ly poisonous to the human constitution ; that in
no case whatever are they necessary or even useful
to persons in health; that they are always, in
every case, and to the smallest extent deleterious,
pernicious or destructive, according to the propor-
tions in which they may be taken into the system,
so that not only is an immense amount of human
food destroyed, whilst thousands are inadequately
fed; but this food is destroyed in such a manner
as to injure greatly the agricultural producei-s
themselves ; for whose grain, but for this perverted
and mistaken use of it, there would be twice the
present demand for the use of the now scantily
fed people, who would then have healthy appe-
tites to consume, and improved means to pur-
chase nutriment for themselves and children, in
c/rain, as well as in all the other varied produc-
tions of the earth.
'' 2, The increase of pauperism in its most fear-
ful shape, divested of that sense of shame which
would disdain to receive relief, whilst honest in-
dustry could secure the humblest independence,
and associated with a disregard of consequences
and a recklessness of all obligations, domestic or
social.
" 3. The spread of crime in every shape and
form, from theft, fraud, and prostitution in the
young, to burnings, robberies, and more hardened
offences in the old ; by which the gaols and pri-
sons, the hulks, and convict transpoils are filled
with inmates ; and an enormous mass of human
beings, who, under sober habits and moral train-
ing, would be sources of wealth and strength to
the country are transfonned, chiefly through the
remote or immediate influence of intoxicating
drinks, into excrescences of corruption and weak-
ness ; the population thus made ciiminal being
like the grain, subjected to distillation, converted
from a wholesome source of strength and prospe-
rity into a poisoned issue of weakness and decay.
"4. The retardation of all improvement, in-
ventive or industrial, civil or political, moral or
religious; the hindering of education; the weak-
ening of good example, and the creation of con-
stant and increasing difficulties in the propagation
of sound morality and subhme truths of the
Gospel, both at home and abroad, according to
the testimony of teachers, pastors, and others,
examined by your Conmiittee."
8
■
«m
Remedies to be Applied.
" That the remedies to bo applied to the cure
of evils so deeply rooted, so long established, so
widely spread, and so strongly supported by sel-
fish indulgence, ignorance, prejudice, custom and
pecuniary interests, are two-fold; fii-st, legislation;
and, secondly, moral.
" That the right to exercise legislative inter-
ference for the coiTection of any evil which aftect.s
the public weal, cannot be questioned, without
dissolving society into its primitive elements, and
going back from the combined and co-operative
state of civilization, with all its wholesome and
lawfully imposed restraints, to the isolated and
lawless condition of savage and solitary nature.
" That the power to apply con'ection by legis-
lative means cannot be doubted, without suppos-
ing the sober, the intelligent, the just and the
inoral portion of the community unable to con-
trol the excesses of the ignorant and disorderly,
which would be to declare our incapacity to main-
tain the first principles of government, by ensur-
ing the public safety."
" That the sound 'policy of applying legislative
power to direct, restrain or punish, as the cases
may require, the vicious and contaminating pro-
pensities of the evil disposed, cannot be disputed,
■
without iiivali(Jatii)g the riglit of government to
protect the ' • locent from the violence of the
guilty; which would in effect declare all govern-
ment to be useless, and all lawful authority to be
without any intelligible object or end."
Among various other immediate remedies pro-
posed in the Report, the following are recom-
mended :—
1. "The encouragement of Temperance So-
cieties in every town and village of the kingdom;
the only bond of association being, a voluntary
engagement to abstain from the use of ardent
spirits, as a customary d)ink, and to discourage by
precept and example, all habits of intemperance
in others."
2. « The diffusion of sound information as to
the extensive evils produced to individuals and
to the state by the use of any beverage that
destroys the health, cripples the industiy, and
poisons the morals of its victims."
3. " The institution of every subordinate auxili-
ary means of promoting the reformation of all
such usages, courtesies, habits and customs of the
people, as lead to intempo-ate habits."
4. « A national system of education, which
should ensure the means of instruction to all ranks
and classes of the people, and which, in addition
to the various branches of requisite and appro-
priate knowledge, should embrace, as an essential
10
part of the instruction given by it to every child
in the kingdora, accurate information as to the
poisonous and invariably deleterious nature of
ardent spirits as an article of diet, in any form or
shape; and the inculcation of a sense of shame
at the crime of voluntarily destroying or thought-
lessly obsciu-ing that faculty of reasoning and
that consciousness of responsibility which chiefly
distinguish man from the brute, 3iid which his
Almighty Maker, when he created him in his own
image, implanted in the human race, to cultivate,
to improve, and to refine; and not to corrupt, to
brutalize, and to destroy."
The following are the ultimate remedies re-
commended m the Report: —
1. "The absolute prohibition of the importa-
tion from any foreign countr)^, or from our own
colonies, of distilled spirits in any shape.
2. " The equally absolute prohibition of all dis-
tillation of ardent spirits from grain, tlie most
important part of the food of man in our own
country.
3. " The restriction of distillation from other
materials, to the purposes of the arts, manufactui-es
and medicine, and the confining the wholesale
and retail dealing in such articles to chemists,
druggists, and dispensaries alone."
The Report contains the following concludincf
suggestions ; —
" Your Committee deeply impressed vith the
11
long catalogue of evils which they have endea-
voured thus briefly and faintly to describe, and
feeling the strongest and most earnest desire to
lessen their number and amount, humbly venture
to suggest to the House the importance of drawing
the attention of Her Majesty's Government to the
immediate introduction of such improvements as
your Committee have recommended in the navy
and army, and in the ships employed in the
merchant service; to the ca,usingsuch other ame-
liorations to be made in this respect as cau be
effected by their authority, wherever that may
extei.d; and to the public declaration of their
determination to introduce early in the ensuing
Session some general and comprehensive law for
the progressive diminution and ultimate suppres-
sion of all the existing facilities and means of
intemperance as the root and parent of almost
every other vice,
"They venture still further to recommend the
most extensive circulation during the recess
under the direct sanction of the Legislature, of
an abstract of the evidence obtained by this in-
quiry in a cheap and portable volume, as was
done with the Poor Law Report, to which it
would form the best auxiliary; the national cost
of intoxication, and its consequences, being ten-
fold gTeater in amount than that of the poor
rates and pauperism itself, being indeed chiefly
caused by habits of intemperance."
12
To the Honorable the Legislative Council
and Assembly of Canada^ in Parliament
assembled.
It will be seen that several of the foregoing
clauses of the said approved and adopted Report
afford the most express and the highest authority
in proof that the Legislature, both Imperial and
Colonial, possess the right and the power, accord-
ing to the principles of the English Constitution,
to pass such enactments for the ultimate and
entire prohibition of the manufacture and sale of
intoxicating liquors, as ordinary beverages, as may
under existing circumstances seem requisite or
expedient. As it is most deplorably manifest)
that all the great evils attending the sale and the
use of those liquoi*s as a beverage, are still most
extensively and deeply afflicting die various
communities of this Province, the special and
serious attention of the members of the Provincial
Parliament, and of all reflecting and well-disposed
persons among us, is most earnestly and respect-
fully requested to the subject at large, and their
influence and co-operation are especially desired
in support of the applications which are being
made to the said Parliament, in the present Ses-
sion, for the passing of some enactments for the
immediate or early prohibition of the traflic in
those liquors as articles of ordinary beverage.
I certify that the e extracts are correct,
and Editoi-s generally v\ aid confer a favour on the
cause of humanity by giving them an insertion.
Rowland Burr.
Maine Liquor Law Agent.
Toronto, January, 1853.
14
AN INCIDENT.
In these days of the "Maine Law," there are
many and lamenting voices croaking out their
Jeremiads over the invasion of human rifrJits
which they charge upon that most just and bene-
ficent legislation.
" May not men choose their beverage ? Mav
they not decide for themselves, the questions,
*What shall we eat, and what shall we drink?
What tyranny to interdict the free exercise of
these natural rights !"
Perhaps it has not occurred to these advocates
of the larg^^st liberty that many of those for whom
they offer such disinterested pleading pray no
prayer with so much fervor and sincerity as this:
" Save us from such friends !"
Some months since, when the adoption of the
"Maine law " was about to be submitted to the
suffrage of the people in a neighboring state, I
had occasion to be driven a short distance, in a
hired carriage, from a railroad depot in that state
to a village a few miles off the tracks Upon
taking my seat in the carriage, I found that !
had for a driver a man whom I had known, when
I was a boy, as one of the young men prominent
in the circles of young people as the " prince of
good fellows." His appearance was very much
15
changed from what 1 remembered it in those
times to'whioh my thoughts instantly carried me
back. The change was not one for the better.
There were manifold and manifest indications in
his face> and person, and speech, that excesses at
the bowl had wrought sad havoc upon him. "
Said he, " I s'pose you don't remember me,
though I know you."
" O, yes, I do," I replied, " though you have al-
tered a good deal since I have seen you."
He seemed to feel what was implied in the
change of which I spoke, and was silent for a
moment; then, without any very remote transition,
began again,
" 1 am working hard for the election."
« Well, how is it going ?"
"O," said he, " I am a Whig ; I always was a
Whig : and I always mean to be ; I go that
ticket."
«« What," I inquired, « Liquor bill and all ?"
" Yes, sir ! if I never was a Whig before, I
would be now, to put that bill through."
Had I mistaken the character and cause of
the change I had noticed in him ? I looked at
him again to correct or confirm my judgmeni.
He seemed to understand the significance of the
glance, and went • k ;
" Yes, I go for that bill. They laugh at me
at the tavern there for that. They all know I
16
love a glass of rum, and take it loo. But I tell
them, I am the very man to vote for that law.
If ever a poor fellow knew what such a law
would be worth to him, I am that man, I do
love rum, and I do drink it, and I will have it as
long as I can get it ; I can't help drinking it
when I see it, and I can't keep away from where
It IS. '
The tears startled out of his eyes.
" Well," he resumed, " it will be a happy day
for my wife, if ever that bill becomes a law."
"I remember her, I think."
"Well, she's been a good wife to me, and
sheHl be glad when therein no more rum to be
had:'
That's one of the men whose rights are out-
raged by the "Maine law," whose sufferings
under the tyranny of such despotic legislation are
so pathetically written about, and harangued
about in rum editorials and political gatherings,
whose liberty is so cruelly taken away by the
state, and whose prerogative of self-goverment in
the matter of strong drink is so urgently argued.
Poor, patient, sorrowfr.l wife, the hour of her
gladness has not yet chimed. The help of the
law has been denied her imperilled husband.
Shall we here turn back the wave of light and
blessing which has rolled its bright-crested surge
through the homes of our ancient commonwealth?