[Debate on drunkenness and alcohol licensing in Liverpool.].

Date:
[1876?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: [Debate on drunkenness and alcohol licensing in Liverpool.]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    found anywhere—men who are ever foremost in every good cause. It is untrue to say that they supply drink to drunken persons. That is only one of the calumnies which has been levelled against them. Mr. Sullivan.—They get drunk at the dairies (laughter.) Alderman Devitt.—No, it is not in the dairies they get drunk. Some of the best men of my acquaintance are engaged in that trade. Some of them, I repeat, are as honourable and as noble-minded as are to be found in the community, and they would cut off their right hand before they would supply liquor to any person under the influence of drink (hear, hear.) “ Some of them,” Alderman! Mr. Sullivan himself said “many of them ’’ were honourable and upright men; and such men amongst the traders, surely will not object to a people’s vote on the licenses. No charge was made against the traders; it was the traffic that was impeached. The liquor sold, for instance, in Scotland, by most respectable and pious elders and deacons of the Churches, makes the Scotch people drunk. The character of the man selling the drink does not, cannot alter the attributes of the drink itself. We are convinced cf the respectability of many of the vintners, and long to see them engaged in a more appropriate calling. I doubt not but that among some persons this view will be an unpo¬ pular side of the question to take up, more especially when it is urged that we refuse to give a vote to the working people on a matter affect¬ ing, and vitally affecting, their own interests, but I deny that that issue is raised here by Sir Wilfrid Lawson’s Bill, because the working people would have no voice whatever in deciding the question. (Hear, hear.) I will only say, in conclusion, that if there was more temper and forbearance, and less abuse in considering this question ; if there was an effort made by the advocates of teetotalism in this city to do the best they could for themselves, by their precept as well as by their example, discussions of the sort could be got through harmoniously and quietly, and with as good temper and feeling as I trust we will decide the matter here to-day. (Hear, hear, and applause.) Alderman Levitt’s wish to have the debate fairly conducted, was real and sincere, and deserves our candid and friendly recognition. Alderman M£Swiney, J.P., said that up to a recent period he had but little faith in the efficacy of legislative interference to repress the vice of drunkenness. In common with others who had spoken on the pre¬ sent occasion, he held that an Act of Parliament could not of itself ever c