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NUMBER OF ARRESTS IN CITIES FOR DRUNKENNESS AND FOR DISTURB

ING THE PEACE, WITH NUMBERS PER 10,000 OF POPULATION

FOR EACH OFFENSE.

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NUMBER OF ARRESTS IN CITIES FOR DRUNKENNESS AND FOR DISTURB

ING THE PEACE, WITH NUMBERS PER 10,000 OF POPULATION
FOR EACH OFFENSE.-Continued.

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NUMBER OF ARRESTS IN CITIES FOR DRUNKENNESS AND FOR DISTURB

ING THE PEACE, WITH NUMBERS PER 10,000 OF POPULATION

FOR EACH OFFENSE.-Continued.

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one may make some allowance for a larger number of arrests on this account.

But if prohibition of the sale of liquor is more than a dead letter, it must inexorably follow that the effect of its suppression should be strongly reflected in a lessened amount of public intoxication. If the volume of drunkenness fluctuates with the opportunity or temptation to drink—and this is the orthodox temperance view-then a large ratio of arrests for drunkenness is indubitable proof that the restrictions are inoperative and do not yield improved social conditions. In this light it is pertinent to examine the statistics of arrests for drunkenness in some no-license and prohibition cities.

The city of Brockton, Mass., has been under no-license longer than any municipality of an equal population, and is sufficiently isolated not to have conditions complicated by the proximity of a license centre. Below are the ratios of arrests for drunkenness in 1905 per 10,000 of population in several other Massachusetts cities under license and in Brockton.

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With the exception of Lowell, all the other cities show up very favorably along side of Brockton. No comparisons could be fairer than between cities in a compact State like Massachusetts, where arrests for drunkenness are regulated by uniform law and where public sentiment in regard to their enforcement partakes of the same character. If it be said that more favorable no-license statistics could have been adduced for the cities of Cambridge, Somerville, Newton, etc., the answer is that they are adjacent to Boston, which makes comparisons invalid, and that a large quota of arrests of inhabitants of these cities appear annually in the returns for Boston. In regard to Brockton, this much is certain: The evidence to be gleaned from statistics of arrests for drunkenness show no comparative diminution of the liquor habit as the result of no-license

and therefore points to an unregulated consumption of such magnitude as to make Brockton appear to be under local prohibition only in name.

The following are the ratios of arrests for drunkenness and for disturbing the peace during 1905 in cities situated in States. under prohibition:

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It would, perhaps, be unfair to regard conditions in Kansas City, Kansas, as typical because of its immediate proximity to Kansas City, Missouri, which is under license. As a matter of fact, there is every reason to believe that but for the existence of such a safety valve, Kansas City, Kansas, would exhibit a much larger rate of arrests than now. The other Kansas cities certainly are typical. Take the instance of Wichita.

Of all the 67 cities of the United States having less than 50,000 population in 1905, and scattered over no less than 26 States, only eight outrank Wichita in proportion of arrests for drunkenness and for disturbing the peace.

These eight are Birmingham, Alabama; Augusta, Georgia; Mobile, Alabama; East St. Louis, Illinois; Little Rock, Arkansas; Jacksonville, Florida; Chattanooga, Tennessee; and Macon, Georgia. Observe that with one solitary exception, namely, East St. Louis, the presence of a large negro population presents peculiar police problems and gives arrests for disturbing the peace a spécial meaning. Comparisons with cities under some form of license and of larger population could only lend needless emphasis to statements in regard to the extraordinary amount of visible intoxication in Wichita.

Topeka, Kansas, offers more favorable aspects, yet compares unfavorably with nearly one-half of the cities having in 1905 a population of less than 50,000.

There were 47 cities in the United States which had a population of between 50,000 and 100,000, and no less than 32 of them had a lower rate of arrests for drunkenness and for disturbing the

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