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No License In New York

No License In New York image
Parent Issue
Day
28
Month
November
Year
1846
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

No License in New York. "It is now something over three months," says the editor of the Temperance Union, "since a large majority of the freemen of this State declared by ballot, that intoxicating drinks should not be sold as a beverage. Though but little can be determined, from present appearances, what will be the final result of the "legal suasion" thus commenced, yet it is very natural that there should be considerable anxiety in relation to the present state of the cause. We have visited within eight weeks past, every town on the line of travel between Albany and Champlain, in this State; and the result of our inquiries, which have been as minute as possible, of both friends and enemies of the cause, is, that about one half of those who sold, before the new law went into operation, have stopped selling entirely; about two thirds of the other half, if they sell at all, do it so privately as to elude all efforts at being detected; and only one sixth are engaged openly and publicly in the sale. We have seen a great many persons refused, and have seen but two successful efforts to obiain intoxicating drinks, and those were at the same bar, and at the same time. We never traveled half the distance before, without seeing some persons drink at almost every public house." We subjoin also the following from the Mercantile Journal: "Four weeks ago there were in this city three hundred places notoriously open on the Sabbath, for the sale of spirits. The City Marshal called the venders together and used every argument to induce them to close; the result was that the great majority yielded, through a sense of what was due to right and public sentiment. On the next Sabbath, but ten of the three hundred were found open by the police. Moral suasion was again tried upon these, in many cases with the desired result. - Those, however, who kept open, reaped a golden harvest, in some cases amounting, as they boasted, to hundreds of dollars. According to the old custom, they expected to pay a fine of twenty dollars on Monday, for having made twenty times the amount on the day before. - During the week, warrants were obtained against these persons for breaches of the License Law, and the police armed with I these warrants made their rounds on the next Sabbath. They found but two places open. They arrested the keepers on the warrants, and committed them to jail until Monday morning. When the cases came up for hearing they were nol. plus'd, on the agreement not again to open on the Sabbath. The same process was again repeated yesterday; three more were arrested; and we trust it will be persevered in against those who not only set the laws of God and man at defiance, but do it even against the sentiment and example of the great majority of those who are engaged in the traffic.