No. 148. IN CONVENTION December 2, 1867. MINORITY REPORT FROM THE COMMITTEE ON THE ADULTERATION AND SALE OF STRONG AND SPIRITUOUS LIQUORS. The undersigned two of the Committee upon the Adulteration and Sale of Strong and Spirituous Liquors, report in favor of incorporating in the Constitution the following provision: 1 The Legislature may pass laws prohibiting the sale of strong 2 and spirituous liquors. EZRA GRAVES, November 26, 1867. We think a prohibitory law now would hurt rather than help the cause of temperance. It would not be generally enforced, and liquor would be sold in many places without any restraint. If total abstinence shall ever become the steady, and not a fitful wish of a [CON. No. 148.] 1 majority of the people, we see no reason why they should not enforce it by law. A constitutional provision may be unnecessary to confer power upon the Legislature to enact a prohibitory law; to remove the doubt upon the question we concur in recommending the above section. J. S. LANDON, L. D. ELY. The undersigned in submitting this report feel somewhat embarrassed in consequence of the multiplied communications received, expressing so many opinions upon the question of prohibition; upon the question of license, or the unrestricted sale of intoxicating liquors. They come from the friends of temperance-from the lovers of good order from the moralist and christian, and from interested dealers, all having in view the great interests of society and the best mode of contributing to the progress and success of our government; protecting its citizens against immorality and crime without depriving them of their personal rights and privileges. We cannot look with indifference upon the efforts which have been made to bring before this Convention a concentrated public judgment, upon the effects of the traffic in intoxicating drinks; also to establish the opinion that an unrestricted sale of both malt and spirituous liquors should be tolerated as a right in a government having its foundation in equal rights to all, and also to impress upon the committee the fact that malt liquors are harmless in their properties, and can with safety and propriety be established as a national beverage. We can but regard these opinions as coming from earnest heads and honest hearts, although they differ widely in the means to be used to obtain the end. We have been compelled from the character of the petitioners and the great magnitude of the question involved, to give careful attention and full weight to the many reasons which have been offered to establish these divided opinions, and while we think that many of these memorialists have failed to prove the correctness of their opinions, yet we see no want of sincerity in the manner in which they have urged their claims, each asking the adoption of their peculiar views as the basis upon which the superstructure of temperance and good order should be established; and each giving his experience as a test of the soundness of his argument. The advocates of temperance reform are not a unit upon the best mode to |