Mr. Fox:-In regard to your criticism, I think it has some point; but at the same time the question of the election of a president as a minority president does not involve the question of police problem or law enforcement.

My particular point is that in the enforcement of a law which governs the habits of people and does not relate itself specifically to the question of crime or moral issues, you have got to have the general acquiescence of the people to make the enforcement of the law possible. I think there is a case where a little clear thinking is required.

In regard to the industrial question you have raised, under the operation of these workmen's compensation laws, and with the development of the 8-hour system, the tendency among manufacturers has been to try to find some way, first of all to prevent accidents and, in the second place, to get the same amount of work out of the same number of men in eight hours that they formerly got out of them in nine or ten hours. That, of course, explains the speeding-up system. Now, every employer, I suppose, wants to get as physically competent and efficient men as he can. He is perfectly justified in any process of selection by which he can obtain them. If he thinks he can get better work out of albinos, and the unions do not object to that, why, let him employ all albinos. Of course, as a matter of common sense, he is going to insist on getting sober men, and even the labor unions agree that drunkenness is a proper cause for discharge.

A good many of the employers, it seems to me, particularly the large corporations, are going farther than they are fairly justified in going. I concede that an employer has a perfect right to make any proper rules for the conduct of his men during the time that he pays for, and he also has the right to insist that his men shall be physically fit, and that they shall turn up in good condition when they come to their work, but when he goes beyond that and tries to say what a man shall do or shall not do in his own time and in his own way, I think he is going too far, and that is what a good many employers are trying to do. Some of them are carrying it to the point of coercion. I know of a number of cases in which men have been discharged because they would not vote a town

"dry," or because they signed applications for licenses, and various other things of that sort.

We have not yet a large body of statistics in this country which cover conclusively this question of industrial accidents and industrial efficiency, but we are getting a good deal of data together, and an investigation has been recently made which covers everything of an official nature in regard to factory statistics, the railway statistics compiled by the Inter-State Commerce Commission, the industrial investigation made by the Federal Government, and such data as can be obtained from large employers. The substance of that testimony is, first of all, that alcohol is not a factor or is rather a negligible factor in industrial accidents. In railroad accidents it enters into the calculation as a factor in less than one per cent of the cases. In the industries, large employers are simply guessing at it. One of the investigators who went to the superintendents of the large iron and steel mills last month found that they did not have any figures themselves; it was purely an assumption.

In regard to industrial efficiency, that is clouded in doubt. The Anti-Saloon League made a statement in a hearing in Massachusetts a while back that more accidents occurred on Mondays, and most accidents occurred in the early hours of Monday, because the men were still under the influence of a week-end spree. Now, in Massachusetts they have a lot of data on the subject, and the official reports show, first, that quite as many accidents occur on Tuesday and Wednesday as on Monday, and, in the second place, that most of the accidents occur between II and 12 o'clock in the morning and about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, when the men are under the influence of fatigue; that fatigue is the factor which is most determining. Then our opponents came back and said "Yes, but it takes two hours for the alcohol to get in its work." (Laughter.)

"THE STRUGGLE AGAINST ALCOHOLISM"

In 1907 Dr. L. Viaud and H. A. Vasnier published in Paris a book entitled "La Lutte Contre L'Alcolism" (The Struggle Against Alcoholism) which at once attracted wide attention, not only because of the reputation of the authors, but also for the ability displayed in their treatment of the subject. A preface contributed by Emile Cheysson, president of the National (French) League Against Alcohol, indorsed and emphasized the views expressed in the book. It is noteworthy that while the writers, who spoke from scientific knowledge and an intimate acquaintance with the social features of the problem, denounced absinthe and the distilled liquors, they had no condemnation for the rational employment of beer, light wine and the like, and even advocated their use as in the nature of “antidotes" for the stronger beverages. Some excerpts made at random from preface and body of book follow:

In the great drama of alcoholism the beverages known as hygienics play an important part and it is proper to recognize the character of their importance. Speaking generally, the title is applied to wine, cider, perry and beer, drinks fermented from domestic extracts, and to these should be added coffee and tea; beverages of foreign origin non-alcoholic and which therefore are one of the factors in the anti-alcoholic problem. The actual prevalence of domestic hygienic beverages started with the law of 1900 which went into effect on Jan. 1, 1901. Under it the government duties on fermented drinks were lowered. The local duties were reduced or altogether suppressed, and as a counter stroke an extra tax of 30 per cent was levied on alcohol. When this was enacted many of the hygienic reviews and medical journals raised a cry of indignation, not only because the privileges of private distillers were allowed to remain, but because the duty on wine, cider and perry had been reduced. Admittedly the law of Jan. 1, 1901, is not correct. In fixing the duty on alcohol at almost ten times its intrinsic value fraud is particularly encouraged, and is facilitated on the other hand by the existence of the privilege of the private stills which should have been abolished, but were not abolished but only regu

lated later by financial law of 1903. As regards the decrease in the duty on hygienic beverages, we consider that it was wise and that it was very greatly beneficial. To preach to nearly 40,000,000 French people the theory of pure water, and to believe that they would listen, is an insane dream. It is even reasonable not to consider the consumption of wine, cider and beer as a necessary evil and without remedy, but to regard, moreover, the habit of winedrinking as one of the antidotes of alcoholism.

When phylloxera ravaged the French vineyards, wine became scarce and the consumption of distilled liquors greatly increased. Rare and occasional intoxication became actual drunkenness. This was less on account of the consumption of fermented liquors than due to the use of brandy.

In the Journal des Debats of April, 1899, Monsieur E. Rostand published an extract from one of the letters of his correspondents which confirms in every respect this point of view:

"In our country they drink only domestic white wines. The phylloxera has come. Vines are destroyed. Some are replanted, but in waiting for the remote harvest they mix alcohol with water; little by little the dose is increased and then the peasants become victims of alcohol. The retailers even go in wagons around the country selling alcohol by the cask. They stop in villages and offer their detestable merchandise."

According to Doctors Busselet and Degrave, wine is one of the most efficacious weapons against alcoholism. According to Dr. Mascarel, Chief Physician for 40 years at the hospital of Chatellerault, the wine which nourished the shipwrecked people from the Meduse for 30 days was not a poison. The Director of the Pasteur Institute, M. Declaux, commenting on the experiences of Benedict and Atwater, has written that a healthy man can drink without any danger 75 centiliters (.076 quarts) of wine per day.

The most ardent defender of wine in France is without question Dr. Mauriac, who, at the Congress for the Advancement of Sciences held at Montauban in August, 1902, presented two communications on this subject. In the first he quoted the history of the Bordelaise temperance measures, and showed the good results obtained by the efforts of Dr. Lande and Messrs. Baysselance and Cazalet, creators of this establishment, in which wine was drunk as a means of combating alcoholism. In the second communication

in which is considered the fight against alcoholism by the encouragement of wine, Dr. Mauriac established that the best means of restricting the consumption of alcohol is to promote the use of wine, an inoffensive, agreeable and even valuable beverage which, although objected to by the more radical temperance advocates, is not instrumental in the promotion of alcoholism. Among the conclusions the doctor presented were the following:

To effectively fight alcohol there should be created in all the towns and communities of any importance stores and temperance restaurants where wine is sold.

Put to a vote after a long discussion, these conclusions were adopted by a strong majority. The members of the Congress present consequently avoided the satire applied to the members of the AntiAlcohol Congress, held in Bremen in 1903. "To the ox it is water that gives strength. To man it is beer and the juice of the vine; therefore do not despise beer and wine if you do not wish to become an ox."

At a meeting of the Society for the Advancement of Sciences, held at Bordeaux in April, 1903, Prof. Arnozan stated that wine comprised all the properties of a real nutriment, and that from observations taken by him in hospitals, and investigations made by him in the Medoc and by Mr. Regis in the Charantes, it was found that the public health in these regions of wine is good; that madness and tuberculosis are by no means frequent, but that the latter disease is frequently encountered among the poor people who, while doing laborious work, drink water. And in Bordeaux, said these two authorities, much wine is drunk and there are but few alcoholics. Alcoholism is only progressing among the working class who drink spirits and not wine.

Passing through Brittany, Normandy and Picardy, you can find in any café or saloon that they do not consume wine, cider or beer. The custom at all times in these places is to drink coffee with brandy.

Brunon of Rouen, who is one of the most reliable specialists on the subject and one of the most competent apostles in the crusade of temperance, has written that cider no longer is found in the saloons of the village and towns, neither do the Normans drink it at home.

The same author, describing an investigation in regard to the workmen on the spinning wheels and in the weaving mills of Rouen,