Footnotes:
[1] A Report on Marriage and Divorce in the United States, by Carroll D. Wright, Commission of Labour. Revised edition, Washington, 1891.
[2] Mr. C. W. Jones, Inspector of Prisons and Gaols, Maine, to whom I am indebted for these figures, adds that the increase in commitments in recent years “is not because those crimes are on the increase, but because of the better enforcement of our laws relating to those crimes”.
[3] The Report of Commissioner of Internal Revenue, pp. 314-319. Washington, 1892. There are no returns available for any year after 1887, as since then Maine has ceased to be reckoned as a separate district for revenue purposes.
[4] For many of these particulars about the condition of affairs in Iowa in 1893 I am indebted to the Toronto Globe for November and December, 1893. This journal, with enterprise that is deserving of all commendation, sent two representatives, one an avowed prohibitionist and the other opposed to prohibition, to Iowa and Kansas, in order to gather full particulars of the results obtained from the liquor laws there. The two commissioners, Messrs. J. E. Atkinson and J. A. Ewan, performed their mission excellently, and their reports are of more than temporary value. I may, however, add that I have by no means solely depended on the reports of these gentlemen in ascertaining the condition of Iowa. Other accounts, from varied sources, all tend to show the disgraceful and deplorable condition of this State under the law that failed.
[5] This statement was made before the Royal Commission on the Liquor Traffic. At the time of writing this, the official reports of the evidence given before the Commission are not yet issued; consequently, I am obliged to rely on the somewhat abridged accounts given in the Canadian daily papers.
[6] Montreal Daily Star, 29th December, 1893.
[7] Victorian Alliance Annual for 1890, Melbourne.
[8] This translation is taken from the Special Report of the United States Commissioner of Labour on The Gothenburg System of Liquor Traffic, Washington, 1893. I would here acknowledge my very deep indebtedness to this volume for many of the statistics contained in this chapter. Dr. Gould’s work is unquestionably the fullest and most accurate book on the subject in the English language, or, as far as I am aware, in any other.
[9] It is well known that the number of arrests for drunkenness is no adequate guide to the amount of intoxication. Speaking in the House of Commons, 13th March, 1877, on this point, Mr. Chamberlain said: “I have come to the conclusion that for our purpose police statistics are no good at all. As an evidence of this I will mention something with which I am acquainted in Birmingham. On a certain Saturday the number of persons arrested for drunkenness and brought before the magistrates was said to be 29—that was the total number of drunken cases credited, or rather, as I should say, debited to the town, according to the police statistics. During three hours of that same Saturday night, thirty-five houses in different parts of the town, beer houses, spirit shops and shops of other descriptions, were watched by different persons appointed for the purpose; and these persons reported that during those three hours 9159 males and 5006 females came out of those shops; and, out of these numbers, of the male persons there were 622 drunk, and 176 females in the same state. There is a total of 798 drunken persons, alleged to have been seen coming out of 35 houses in three hours; while the police returns only reported 29 for the day.”