Temperance | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Feb 2, 1882

Temperance.

Relation of Intemperance to Crime.

It is beyond question that strong drink inflames the baser passions of human nature. Persons who, when sober, are mild tempered, amiable, and correct in deportment, become fiends incarnate when under the influence of drink. The devoted husband and affectionate father is transformed into a brutal tyrant, before whose demoniacal ravings and cruel persecution affection flies and helpless dependence cowers in terror. Reason is dethroned, and rage and lust hurry the poor wretch onward to crimes at which his whole nature would revolt when not under the power of the destroyer.

Or if the victim of the traffic is naturally vicious, strong drink excites and fortifies the evil tendencies of his nature, and nerves him to deeds of darker guilt than he would otherwise perpetrate. The oft-quoted circumstance attending the killing of President Lincoln is a case in point. Brandy was the demon which nerved the courage and steadied the arm of the assassin ere the dastardly deed could be done.

At the trial of a criminal for a murder committed in the city of Coldwater, a few years ago, it was proved that the prisoner drank no less than thirteen times at a single bar in that city on the day of the murder, and before the crime was committed. The deed was pre-determined; but strong drink fortified the criminal purpose, and induced the necessary recklessness.

Idleness and poverty tend to produce crime, and strong drink is the cause of most of the indolence and pauperism from which the ranks of vice are recruited throughout the world.

Opinions differ as to the proportion of crime that may be legitimately charged to the drinking habits of society, and it is not possible to compute with perfect accuracy the offspring of this prolific parent of vice. All careful observers, however, affirm that the proportion is very large, and it is significant that the widest observers and those who have the best means of informing themselves put the proportion at the highest figures.

Sir Matthew Hale, Lord Chief Justice of England, said nearly two hundred years ago: "Drink is the cause of four-fifths of all crimes;" and modern jurists have seen no reason for reviewing the judgment.

The Hon. John C. Park, district attorney for the county of Suffolk, Massachusetts, affirmed that careful observation during his incumbency in office led him to the conclusion that ninety-nine hundredths of all crime committed were the result of intemperance. Similar testimony might be had from nearly every county in the union. But the objection lying against such testimony is that it is merely the judgment of individuals formed from observation, and lacks the solidity and tangibility of actual facts and figures. A more satisfactory result is obtained by instituting comparisons. For example, the decrease of crime where prohibition has been enforced leads to conclusions which warrant the very highest estimates given above.

During the great riots which occurred at Belfast some years ago, the lawfully constituted authorities were at their wits' end. Property and life were at the mercy of the furious mob; murders were numerous and the sky was lurid with the flames of burning buildings. After a time the municipal authorities issued an order closing all the dram shops of the city. Soon the mob began to melt away, and in twenty-four hours' time the riot had entirely subsided. No riot is possible where no liquor is to be had.

Lord Hamilton, a member of the British parliament, testified that in the county which he represented—a county containing 10,000 inhabitants—where formerly scenes of drunkenness, riot, and strife were common, and where a large police force was necessary for the preservation of peace and the protection of life and property, subsequently, under prohibition, the district became so quiet and orderly that not a policeman was required within its bounds, and at the same time the poor rates were reduced one-half. In the town of Low Moor, England, there is a population of 1,100, and not a dram shop in the place; there is no jail or lock-up, no constable or policeman. Order reigns supreme.

In Potter County, Pennsylvania, liquor has been excluded under local option; and the jail is without an inmate one-half the time.—H. M. Joy, in Lever.